Do We Really Want To Talk About McCain and the Cross?

There seem to be an awful lot of blog posts regarding whether John McCain altered his personal history and plagiarized the cross in the dirt story from a story in Alexander Solzhenitsyn’s The Gulag Archipelago. The Jed Report summarizes the argument against McCain, but it turns out that the story wasn’t even from Solzhenitsyn. Andrew Sullivan argues for its significance and denies that he is Swift Boating John McCain. Regardless of whether this argument is valid, I wonder if this argument is really worthwhile.

If we are to make revision of one’s biography a matter for voting upon, we must keep in mind the fact that Barack Obama did take some liberties with his own biography in Dreams From My Father. Should the rumors be true and Obama choose Biden as his running mate, there’s also the problem that Biden has had his own problems with plagiarism in the past.

Even if the charges against McCain are true here, all this does is to keep discussion going of McCain’s experience as a POW, which will ultimately work to his benefit. The questions of whether he embellished his biography with this story are not even what anyone will ever vote on. There are considerable differences between Obama and McCain on the issues which matter. These are what we should be concentrating on.

4 Comments

  1. 1
    Angellight says:

    We absolutely should be talking about the Cross in the Sand story.  Americans demand and want truth from their politicians.  They have been lied to before and don’t want that.  It goes to character and trust.  Any intelligent person should know that.  Do you want your children, spouse, lover lying to you.  It’s that kind of relationship.

    At Saddleback Christian Conference, Barack Obama was speaking as a Christian to Christians.  McCain was speaking as a politician to Christians.  I believe the Christian audience was more enamoured of Obama who was speaking their language than McCain who was not. 
    Every campaign season GOP scare — Dems will raise your taxes!  George Bush did not Raise Taxes and yet, are we any better off for it?  We have to wake up from this rheteroic which distorts the issues and the truth.  Not raising your taxes only means that something else will have to be raised like your medical insurance or car insurance, bank and financial fees, etc.   Raising your taxes is not the issue, the issue is what will the candidate do for the country and the American people, for jobs, schools, cost of education and health care.  Let’s not get it twisted.  It is time to wake up from the scare tactics and embrace real change that is positive and not words with no deeds which only leads to the decaying of America
     
    You don’t need Washington experience to be experienced.  You need to be smart, foreward thinking, independent of big business and oil companies, knowledgeable about economics and the Constitution.  It doesn’t take  rocket science to know how to get along with other people around the world — treat others like you would want them to treat you.
     ‘The massed power of goodwill,
      the dynamic effect of intelligent and active understanding, and
      the potency of a trained and alive public opinion,
      which desires the greatest good of the greatest number
      are beyond belief.
     
      This dynamic power has never been employed.
      It can today save the world.’
    Djwhal Khul

  2. 2
    Ron Chusid says:

    McCain’s dishonesty is definitely an issue which should be discussed–as I have done in several previous posts. I have also commented on the manner in which he pandered at Saddleback.

    There are plenty of more relevant cases of McCain being dishonest, such as the manner in which he repeatedly lies about Obama’s positions on taxes. These are far better examples to use than the cross in the dirt story. I don’t think we are going to win an argument which starts with questioning McCain’s account of his time as a POW.

  3. 3
    Jerry says:

    OK, I admit it; I’ve “flip flopped” on this issue.  No, we shouldn’t be talking about McCain’s cross.  IMHO, it’s probably not a true story and it’s one more reason I dislike the man.  But that’s my personal opinion and I’m no longer going to raise it.  You are absolutely correct: there are plenty of lies that can be proven if we’re not focused on one that can’t be.  And it does bring back a period 300 – er I mean 30 – years ago that should not be brought up if Obama wants to win.

  4. 4
    dualdiagnosis says:

    Please continue to bring this up.

    Accuse McCain of making up stories of his time as a POW, especially completely unprovable accusations.

    Who can say whether his story about the guard that loosened his bindings is really true? No one else was there.

    Please, more.

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