Oh. My. God. Did anyone see John Kerry's speech?! The passion, the clarity--he was so on. It was the best speech that hardly anyone saw, self included since I was out of the house until late and had to catch Biden's speech in the car.

THAT candidate would have won.

And I'll tell ya something else: I think that Kerry would have had EVERY right to be bitter about things. It would be perfectly understandable if he thought "It shoulda been me." And perhaps he does and just hides it well. Well let me tell ya: It's the Oscar performance of a lifetime, because he's a more effective surrogate for Barack Obama than he ever was for himself.

Damn if it doesn't take a strong person to stand up like he has, and really lay it on the line for Obama. Kerry has his faults, and he bears responsibility for his campaign, of course, but I think, fundamentally, John Kerry is a good man who was criminally ill-served.

Sorry to jack the thread...I just had to share. Carry on.

Can't hear ya, Peach!

Bravo! Thanks for laying it all out. This should be reposted everywhere (assuming that's okay -- IIRC Steven has previously given me permission to repost his work, but I'm asking anyway)

I've posted this at Digg, so please rate it up there:
http://digg.com/2008_us_elections/John_McCain_is_no_hero

Have you heard, Steven, of McCain's most recent endorsement; Nemesis.  Rumor has it that the famous lady has moved from Greece to America and that she is going all out for the Republican ticket.  Wonder what she has in store for these United States.

May joy and enthusiasm be with us always!

There is reason to believe that McCain actually collaborated with the North Vietnamese, which would make him not merely not a hero, but the opposite of one. When I mentioned this earlier, Booman replied that subjecting McCain's self-presentation of his POW experience to question is off limits, but I don't really see why that should be so, if there is sufficient prima facie evidence to doubt it, which there seems to be. McCain's collaborating with the North Vietnamese would be consistent with everything else we know about him.

John McCain: War Hero or North Vietnam's Go-To Collaborator?

What really happened when McCain was a POW?

Republicans are like fetuses: both are incapable of thought. That's why Republicans are against abortion.

McCain is riding on the military worship that has reached a point of mental illness in this country. Like dogmatic religion, it has become a serious obstacle to rational discussion of policy and ethical behavior. Because the military has become America's de facto god, it is proposed as the solution to every threat, every crisis, that would be better solved by other means.

Yes, the troops in the field deserve our empathy and our support for trying to do their duty, for being victims of malevolent forces overseas and at home. That does not make what they accomplish as a group heroic or useful in itself. Individual heroism, yes. But true heroism cannot be separated from its results, and the results in the case of Iraq and Vietnam have proven to be a net minus on the scale of America's security and well-being.

McCain, like his fellow soldiers in Vietnam, was a victim of both the enemy there and his own government. He was more unlucky than many in being captured, but that doesn't make him a hero. It makes him a victim who suffered from a particularly bad run of luck and/or ineptitude -- like millions or billions of humans around the world do every day. It hurts to say it, but his suffering brought no benefit to the United States as a nation so it does not qualify him as a national hero.

Sometimes suffering is ennobling and enlarges human empathy. That is the heroic journey. Other times suffering simply shrinks the spirit and nurtures little more than lifelong self-absorption. That appears to be the where McCain's path took him since Vietnam. His suffering deserves our sympathy, but its results do not justify our admiration.

FDR's response to progressive demands: "I agree. Now go out and make me do it."

What a guy! But, I bet he would be a "good guy to set down and have a beer with", eh?

We need to push for Progressive change, now more than ever.