McCain's son joins the Marines

[Donkey®]

Originally Posted by article

The McCains and War: Like Father, Like Son
Exclusive: Vietnam hero and Senator John McCain has unyieldingly backed the Iraq war. Now son Jimmy is heading to boot camp and, maybe, to battle
By MASSIMO CALABRESI/WASHINGTON


Posted Saturday, Jul. 29, 2006
This September, Senator John McCain's youngest son, Jimmy, 18, will report to a U.S. Marine Corps depot near Camp Pendleton in San Diego. After three months of boot camp and a month of specialized training, he will be ready to deploy. Depending on the unit he joins, he could be in Iraq as early as this time next year, and his chances of seeing combat at some point are high. Of the 178,000 active-duty Marines in the world, some 80,000 have seen a tour in Iraq or Afghanistan, and there are 25,000 bearing the brunt of some of the worst fighting in Iraq now. About 6,000 Marines have been wounded there, and about 650 have been killed. "I'm obviously very proud of my son," says the elder McCain, "but also understandably a little nervous."

At 70 years old, McCain might have thought his days of living in the shadow of family military men were behind him. His grandfather, Admiral John S. McCain Sr., served in the Pacific in World War II and was present at the Japanese surrender aboard the U.S.S. Missouri. His father, Admiral John S. McCain Jr., commanded U.S. forces in the Pacific during Vietnam, when the young McCain was a prisoner of war in Hanoi. But if the old men cast long shadows, McCain is about to learn that the young ones can too.

Jimmy McCain's deployment will affect more than his family. His father is a leading contender for the White House in 2008. If Jimmy deploys to combat, it appears McCain will join F.D.R. to become one of the very few American presidential candidates ever to have had a son at war. And even the prospect of Jimmy's service will shade the race. Iraq is the most important strategic and political issue facing the U.S. Many Democrats are calling for troop withdrawal to begin immediately, and the Bush Administration is struggling to reduce troop strength by the end of the year. McCain, for his part, is the leading voice calling for increasing the number of U.S. troops there.

In the way that happens more frequently in fiction than in life, a McCain family drama is replaying itself here. As a prisoner of war, Senator McCain voluntarily declined an offer of early release by his Vietnamese captors, extending his stay at the Hanoi Hilton by almost four years and nine months. During that time, his father continued to approve air strikes against Hanoi, knowing his son was there. Now comes Jimmy McCain, putting himself in the line of fire even as his father calls for more troops to be sent to war.

Named after McCain's father-in-law, James Hensley, Jimmy is the lively, happy-go-lucky member of the clan, friends say. During the 2000 campaign, a Boston Globe reporter spotted Jimmy, then 11, chasing his older brother Jack around the house calling him a "pork-barrel spender" — a deep cut in the McCain home. During the same year, when McCain was on the road in New Hampshire, the candidate proudly read aloud from a school report on General George S. Patton by Jimmy that he had faxed to him: "The Tanks Will Roll On."

McCain's personal influences on Jimmy appear to have outweighed the privileges that came with being his son. McCain is rock-star famous, and his wife Cindy came to the marriage with money as the daughter of a Budweiser distributor. While others have signed up for duty — the sons of both Senator Kit Bond of Missouri and Tim Johnson of South Dakota have served combat missions in Iraq — it is nonetheless unusual for children of that background to enlist. By comparison, a recent study by Public Citizen's Congress Watch found at least 32 examples of congressional family members who were lobbyists.

Jimmy knows the risks of war from his father's descriptions of battle, imprisonment and torture in Vietnam. The Senator's book, Faith of My Fathers, dryly relates the experience of "small pieces of hot shrapnel" tearing "into my legs and chest," and of how, in solitary confinement, "the first few weeks are the hardest," as "the onset of despair is immediate" and "formidable." Not exactly a prime recruiting tool for your kids. Still, McCain the elder is phlegmatic. "I don't think there's anything unusual about Jimmy," he says. "There are, thank God, lots of young men and women like him."

In some ways, though, Jimmy is breaking with tradition, rather than following it. His brother Jack, now 20, has just finished his plebe year at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, where his father, grandfather and great-grandfather went before him. And McCain, the Naval aviator and keen interservice competitor, has been known to crack more than a few jokes at the Marines' expense. McCain says he doesn't read much into Jimmy's decision. "I know that he's aware of his family's service background," he says, "but I think the main motivator was, he had friends who were in the Marine Corps, and he'd known Marines, and he'd read about them, and he just wanted to join up."

McCain says his son's service won't change his position on the war; he claims it won't even affect how he feels about it. "Like every parent who has a son or daughter serving that way, you will have great concern, but you'll also have great pride," McCain says. But it will be hard to ignore. If Republicans retain control of the Senate after November's midterm elections, McCain is due to ascend to the chairmanship of the Armed Services Committee in January, a position he has long aimed for. There he will have day-to-day responsibility for the oversight of the war.

And then there's 2008. McCain already has strong national-security credentials. His son's service only strengthens his position. It will neutralize the assertions of the left that Republicans are "chicken hawks," pursuing the war for ideological reasons without any connection to the pain of it. And it will likely have a broader affect on McCain's credibility. Critics have accused McCain of pandering to the right in order to solidify his front-runner status, but the power of that argument is diminished if McCain is seen steadfastly supporting a war even as it endangers his youngest son.

More than anything else, though, the country may find itself viewing Iraq through McCain's eyes as it follows his son's progress. And nothing is more powerful for a candidate than sympathy. Nothing, too, is more irritating to McCain: he seems annoyed by the interest in his son's enlistment. In mid-June, he requested that TIME not run this story and only relented when it appeared other organizations might break the news. In response to most of the heavier questions about Jimmy's motivation and the influence he may have felt from his family, McCain doesn't want to play. "He's an 18-year-old kid," McCain says, and he no doubt remembers what that means. The Senator was such a hell-raiser as a plebe and a pilot that he was nearly forced out of the academy.

Whatever Jimmy's enrollment says about him, his father or the country, candidate McCain is letting it speak for itself, for the most part. Often the clan gathers for a popular July 4 barbeque at McCain's cabin in Arizona. But this year, instead, McCain canceled the picnic, and the Senator, his wife Cindy and Jimmy went to the Quinault Indian reservation in Washington State. "We went fishing and hiking and enjoyed the rain forest there as well as the salmon fishing, although we didn't catch any salmon," he says. "Cindy and I were able to spend a weekend with him. And it was fine." With reporting by Melissa August and Sally B. Donnelly/Washington

This would definitely put the Iraq conflict into the spotlight during any possible campaign.

[7960]

I can't wait to see people say McCain had his son do it to increase his chances of winning.

[Donkey®]

Originally Posted by 7960

I can't wait to see people say McCain had his son do it to increase his chances of winning.

Wouldn't that really backfire since very few people support the conflict at this point?

[7960]

Originally Posted by Donkey®

Wouldn't that really backfire since very few people support the conflict at this point?

but the idea that his son would volunteer to go........that would win votes and wouldn't lose him any.

Mark my words, someone will suggest that he enlisted because "after the election McCain can use his influence to bring his son back home."

[kinggovernor]

he hasn't even been to bootcamp yet

[motivez]

to his son.

But I don't see what McCain had to do with it aside from instilling values in him that made him want to join.

I don't remember seeing anyone call McCain a chickenhawk though. It's just nearly everyone else that's a part of Bush's administration that is.

[Scrum]

Originally Posted by kinggovernor

he hasn't even been to bootcamp yet

Sounds like they are clearing space for his medals already.


I don't see anything coming back on McCain for this at all. He is one of the most popular vets around, and popular on both sides of the isle. I think anyone pointing fingers at him over this would look like idiots.

[7960]

Originally Posted by Scrumtralecent

Sounds like they are clearing space for his medals already.


I don't see anything coming back on McCain for this at all. He is one of the most popular vets around, and popular on both sides of the isle. I think anyone pointing fingers at him over this would look like idiots.

He's popular with everyone but other vets. I still haven't figured out why, but war vets really dislike him.

[kinggovernor]

Originally Posted by 7960

He's popular with everyone but other vets. I still haven't figured out why, but war vets really dislike him.

I like him and hope he is the next president

[kinggovernor]

Originally Posted by Scrumtralecent

Sounds like they are clearing space for his medals already.

20% don't finish bootcamp
5-15% don't finish infantry training

he has a long way to go before he goes to Iraq

[thomez]

He had a kid at 52, what a pimp.

[7960]

Originally Posted by kinggovernor

20% don't finish bootcamp
5-15% don't finish infantry training

he has a long way to go before he goes to Iraq

Would you want to be known as the DI who washed out McCain's son?

He'll make it, even if they have to force him to make it.

[Scrum]

Originally Posted by 7960

He's popular with everyone but other vets. I still haven't figured out why, but war vets really dislike him.

Seems strange that they wouldn't like him.

[kinggovernor]

Originally Posted by 7960

Would you want to be known as the DI who washed out McCain's son?

He'll make it, even if they have to force him to make it.

Riddick Bowe's life after his retirement was filled with a number of odd events. He briefly enlisted in the US Marines, which he described as having been an old dream. Bowe's lax habits did not mix well with the Marine Corp's trademark discipline, however, and he resigned from basic training after barely a week

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riddick_Bowe
they will chase anyone out of there that does not make the cut. But he could break his leg, get sick etc. It happens alot

[7960]

Originally Posted by Scrumtralecent

Seems strange that they wouldn't like him.

I don't know why, but ask a vet and see what he says. My father's brothers were all in vietnam/korea (two were even in WW2 ) and none of them like him. I've never gotten a straight answer as to why.

[Donkey®]

Originally Posted by 7960

I don't know why, but ask a vet and see what he says. My father's brothers were all in vietnam/korea (two were even in WW2 ) and none of them like him. I've never gotten a straight answer as to why.

So I take it they don't like Bush or Kerry either?

[7960]

Originally Posted by Donkey®

So I take it they don't like Bush or Kerry either?

Did I mention bush or kerry?

What I said was they don't like McCain and I don't know why. It would be very easy to make an argument that bush and kerry used their influence to keep from going to war or to leave when he was ready. McCain went, was captured, was a POW, didn't use any clout to get out when he could have......... that's what I'm saying, it doesn't make sense to me. It probably has to do with his voting record since entering politics, I don't know. But the keys here are:

1. IMO there are too many vets who don't like McCain, and
2. I don't know why.

[SpicyMcVoodoo]

Would they really put his kid on the front line? Should they? Isn't he a particularly attractive kidnapping target?

[Donkey®]

Originally Posted by 7960

Did I mention bush or kerry?

What I said was they don't like McCain and I don't know why. It would be very easy to make an argument that bush and kerry used their influence to keep from going to war or to leave when he was ready. McCain went, was captured, was a POW, didn't use any clout to get out when he could have......... that's what I'm saying, it doesn't make sense to me. It probably has to do with his voting record since entering politics, I don't know. But the keys here are:

1. IMO there are too many vets who don't like McCain, and
2. I don't know why.

It was just a question sparky. Enhance your calm.

[7960]

Originally Posted by Donkey®

It was just a question sparky. Enhance your calm.

I see nothing has changed.