Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), a leading candidate for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination, has been one of the key congressional supporters of the interventionist foreign policies of the George W. Bush administration, including the Iraq War. In early April 2007, after taking what the Washington Post described as a "heavily guarded walk through a newly fortified Baghdad market," McCain gushed about the progress in Iraq since the president's "surge" strategy began to be implemented earlier in the year. "Never have I been able to drive from the airport, never have I been able to go out into the city as I was today," McCain said. "But I am not saying 'Mission Accomplished.' ... It's a very difficult task ahead of us" (Washington Post, April 2, 2007). Another member of McCain's delegation, Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN), told journalists that the market was "like a normal outdoor market in Indiana in the summertime" (New York Times, April 2, 2007).
The next day, when a reporter from the New York Times interviewed shopkeepers in the market McCain visited, they derided the Pollyannaish views expressed by McCain and his colleagues. Said one shopkeeper, "What are they talking about? The security procedures were abnormal!" He added: "They paralyzed the market when they came. This was only for the media. This will not change anything." Describing security at the market, the New York Times reported: "The delegation arrived at the market, which is called Shorja, on Sunday with more than 100 soldiers in armored Humvees—the equivalent of an entire company—and attack helicopters circled overhead, a senior American military official in Baghdad said. The soldiers redirected traffic from the area and restricted access to the Americans, witnesses said, and sharpshooters were posted on the roofs. The congressmen wore bulletproof vests throughout their hour long visit" (New York Times, April 2, 2007).
McCain's Baghdad trip was standard fare for the Arizona Republican. Although he is sometimes characterized as a liberal-leaning conservative, in recent years McCain has proved decidedly neoconservative when it comes to Iraq and the war on terror. After returning from an earlier fact-finding trip to Afghanistan, Iraq, and Israel with Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT), in January 2007 McCain and Lieberman presented their opinions on Iraq to an audience at the de facto neoconservative headquarters, the American Enterprise Institute (AEI). Emphasizing his belief that the war there is still "winnable," McCain laid out his argument for a surge in troops in Iraq: "The presence of additional coalition forces would give the Iraqi government the ability to do what it cannot accomplish today on its own—impose its rule throughout the country. In bringing security to Iraq and chiefly to Baghdad, our forces would give the government a fighting chance to pursue reconciliation."
Furthermore, the "surge" of troops must not be brief, but rather 18 months at a minimum, McCain said. This plan was echoed by that proposed by AEI scholar Frederick Kagan and Gen. Jack Keane—unveiled at the same AEI event at which McCain and Lieberman spoke.
McCain's affiliation with the neoconservative political faction reportedly extends to a relationship with Weekly Standard editor William Kristol: "Kristol is predictably modest about his influence on the Arizona senator, although he acknowledges, 'I talked to McCain on the phone and compared notes.' But when McCain wanted to hire a new legislative aide, his chief of staff, Mark Salter—himself a former aide to neoconservative Jeane Kirkpatrick—consulted with Kristol, who recommended a young protégé named Daniel McKivergan. Marshall Wittmann, one of Kristol's closest friends, became a key adviser during McCain's presidential campaign. Randy Scheunemann, who had drafted the Iraq Liberation Act and was on the board of Kristol's Project for the New American Century (PNAC), became McCain's foreign policy adviser. One person who has worked closely with Kristol says of Kristol and McCain, 'They are exceptionally, exceptionally close'" (New Republic, October 16, 2006).
McCain, frequently described by the media as a political maverick, speaks and votes as a social conservative, a fiscal conservative, and a war hawk. Yet a minority of his positions, including those on immigration and corporate regulation—as well as his willingness to join with Democratic partners on congressional bills—have gained him a reputation as an independent.
McCain faces formidable challenges in his campaign to win the Republican presidential nomination in 2008. To bolster his standing among social conservatives, McCain has spoken out in favor of including "intelligent design" in school curricula and attempted to distance himself from earlier criticism of Religious Right figures like Jerry Falwell (he called Falwell an "agent of intolerance" during his failed 2000 presidential bid). Although McCain usually votes as a social conservative on such issues as abortion and gay marriage, his "liberal" views on immigration and climate change have alienated him from many conservatives.
Another obstacle to McCain's ambition to become president is his age. Although generally in good health (the exception being his malignant melanoma diagnosed in 2000), McCain will need to convince voters that he will be a fit and active president, despite becoming what would be the oldest person to move into the White House. If he wins the 2008 election, McCain will be 72 when inaugurated (three years older than Ronald Reagan when he became president) and 80 years old at the end of two terms.
Already some right-wing sectors are organizing against McCain's presidential bid. Right Wing News, an internet source of "conservative news and views," compiled a list of reasons why conservatives should oppose the Arizona senator. In its "Conservative Case Against John McCain in 2008," the political website claims that "the reason McCain is so well liked by the media is because they're liberals and they love it when he trashes other Republicans" on such issues as climate change, campaign finance reform, and immigration. If he becomes the party's nominee, Right Wing News predicts that the mainstream media that "gush over him today would turn on him in a Minnesota minute" and "his poll numbers with Independents and Democrats would start to drop precipitously." Despite his overwhelmingly conservative voting record, McCain will face diehard conservative opposition, says Right Wing News, because he "[spoke out against the] attempt to protect marriage by enshrining it in the Constitution, committed adultery in his first marriage, attacked Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, endangered the lives of all Americans by handcuffing our military interrogators ..."
Like many potential presidential candidates, Democratic or Republican, McCain is a strong supporter of Israel. Speaking at a 2001 conference of the American Israel Political Affairs Committee (AIPAC), McCain said: "In addition to her moral commitment to Israel's security, America must provide Israel with whatever military equipment and technology she requires to defend herself, above and beyond what we supply today if necessary. Our support for Israel must intensify, as threats to Israeli security have intensified." And in a speech to the American Jewish Committee in 2002, McCain said, "I think the Israeli people would agree that we can't wait for rogue regimes like Iran, Iraq, and Syria to develop the weapons that would seriously challenge Israel's defenses, and our own. I think Israelis would agree that a posture of robust deterrence is no longer enough in this age of weapons of mass destruction."
In the midst of the Israel-Lebanon conflict in summer 2006, McCain rejected mounting criticism of Israel for its response to the Hezbollah kidnappings. "What would we do if somebody came across our borders and killed our soldiers and captured our soldiers?" asked McCain. "Do you think we would be exercising total restraint?" (St. Louis Post-Dispatch, July 16, 2006).
While McCain since the late 1990s has talked like a neoconservative on such Middle East issues as U.S. relations with Iran, Iraq, and Syria, he has occasionally departed from their hardline positions. In a May 1, 2006 interview with the defense correspondent for Haaretz, an influential Israeli daily, McCain said that he favored Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations led by someone like Brent Scowcroft or Jim Baker, and he also nodded his assent in response to the following question: "In general a movement toward the June 4, 1967 armistice lines, with minor modifications?" Writing in the New Republic, John Judis commented that the interview—which McCain disputed after an upsurge of Israeli criticism—indicated that McCain might be "closer to George H.W. Bush than to George W. Bush. And that's not a bad thing at all."
McCain may have difficulty explaining his role as cheerleader for the Iraq invasion and as an advocate to "stay the course" with the occupation. As part of the White House campaign to build public and congressional support for the planned invasion, Bruce Jackson, one of the directors of the Project for the New American Century, founded the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq (CLI) in November 2002. While most of the committee members were neoconservatives, the pro-invasion CLI also included leading Republican Party hawks like McCain as well as some hardline Democrats like Lieberman and former Sen. Bob Kerrey (D-NB).
McCain served as honorary co-chair of the invade-Iraq committee, while Randy Scheunemann served as the group's executive director. Scheunemann, while on the staff of then-Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott (R-MS), wrote the Iraq Liberation Act, which authorized $98 million for the Iraqi National Congress and served as a key stepping-stone on the path to the Iraq War. McCain, like Scheunemann, has also served on the board of the International Republican Institute (IRI). In November 2006, McCain gave a speech at the Federalist Society, emphasizing his belief in limited government.
According to CLI's mission statement, "The Committee for the Liberation of Iraq was formed to promote regional peace, political freedom, and international security by replacing the Saddam Hussein regime with a democratic government that respects the rights of the Iraqi people and ceases to threaten the community of nations."
In addition to its "educational and advocacy efforts" for regime change in Iraq, the committee pledged that it was "committed to work beyond the liberation of Iraq to the reconstruction of its economy and the establishment of political pluralism, democratic institutions, and the rule of law." However, shortly after what it called the "successful liberation of Iraq," the committee ceased its operations, failing to fulfill the promises of its mission statement.
McCain has served since 1992 as the chairman of the International Republican Institute, a program of the Republican Party that was created in 1983 as a channel for funding from the then-newly created National Endowment for Democracy. Since its early years of work supporting U.S. partners in Central America and the Caribbean, the IRI has gained a reputation as a surrogate for interventionist U.S. policy around the world. IRI has offices around the world, and currently funds nongovernmental organizations in 50 countries. During the Bush administration, the IRI has been a leading U.S. actor in supporting individuals and organizations that sought to overthrow President Jean-Bertrand Aristide in Haiti (successfully in February 2004) and President Hugo Chavez in Venezuela (unsuccessfully in April 2002). In its April 12, 2004 media release, IRI President George Folsom celebrating the coup said: "The Venezuelan people rose up to defend democracy in their country." Many of the groups implicated in the uprising, which resulted in Chavez's temporary removal from power, had received generous support from the institute.
The principals of IRI span the center right-far right spectrum of the internationalists in the Republican Party. Most of its staff and board have links to right-wing think tanks, foundations, and policy institutes, while many also represent major financial, oil, and defense corporations.
As his voting record shows, McCain is not an independent or moderate posing as a conservative—he is simply quite conservative. Although he does diverge from many on the right with his positions on immigration, corporate regulation, gun control, and environmental issues, McCain has established himself as a social conservative with his consistent positions on gender issues, taxation, and military operations.
In response to Project Vote Smart's 2004 Congressional National Political Awareness Test, McCain declared that he did not support a woman's right to an abortion, except in cases of rape, incest, or if the life of the woman was endangered. He also thinks no public funding should go toward institutions that perform, or merely advocate, the procedure. Given his anti-abortion stance, it is unsurprising that in 2006 McCain did not support the interests of Planned Parenthood during a single vote, and that he supported the interests of the National Right to Life Committee 75% of the time in 2005-2006, according to Project Vote Smart.
Conservative groups, as identified by Project Vote Smart, should generally be pleased with McCain's voting record. He supported the interests of Concerned Women for America 100% of the time in the past few years, the Republican Liberty Caucus 84% of the time in 2005, and the American Conservative Union 80% of the time in 2005. In fall 2004, McCain voted in accord with the Conservative Index as established by the John Birch Society 90% of the time. In contrast, McCain scores low with liberal groups such as the National Committee for an Effective Congress, Americans for Democratic Action, and People for the American Way, where favorable percentages are in the 10-35% range.
With respect to such issues as budget, spending, and taxes, McCain supported the interests of conservative organizations, such as Freedom Works, National Taxpayers Union, and Americans for Tax Reform, 75-90% of the time over the past several years. On civil liberties, the senator's votes backed the interests of the American Civil Liberties Union 0% of the time in the 2001-2002 Congress, increasing to 22-33% of the time in more recent congressional sessions.
Although McCain has spoken out for the need to take measures to reduce climate change, he supported the energy legislation recommended by the liberal Campaign for America's Future only 17% of the time in 2005-2006. On environmental issues, McCain has a mixed record. In the 1999-2000 period, he supported the interests of the League of Conservation Voters just 6% of the time, rising to 45% in 2005. In 2005, he had a 50% voting record with the Defenders of Wildlife and the American Wilderness Coalition.
McCain does not score high on foreign aid and foreign policy issues as defined by liberal groups. He received a B+ rating from Citizens for Global Solutions in 2006, but only 30% from the Friends Committee on National Legislation.
On military issues, McCain had a 27% rating from the liberal Women's Action for New Directions, but a 100% rating from the hawkish Non-Commissioned Officers Association. McCain was also viewed very favorably by the hawkish American Security Council in 2003-2004, and also by the neoconservative-led Center for Security Policy.
On gun issues, McCain has not gained the support of anti-gun control organizations—which may weigh heavily against him if he were the Republican Party's nominee in 2008. In 2005, for example, he never supported the issues of the Gun Owners of America, and the National Rifle Association gave McCain a C+ rating. When it comes to winning over conservative constituencies, McCain will need to overcome his votes on immigration legislation that grant immigrants a path to citizenship. In 2006 McCain supported issues of the American Immigration Lawyers 75% of the time, yet the anti-immigration Federation for American Immigration Reform gave the senator a zero rating.
On trade issues, McCain mostly votes as a free trader, getting an "A" rating from USA Engage in 2005-2006 and an 82% from the libertarian CATO Institute.
