Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said this week that President Obama never made a sincere effort to reach out to him after the 2008 election.
McCain was once seen as a potential ally of Obama. But far from becoming a partner — as the left hoped for and the right feared — McCain has turned into one of Obama’s thorniest adversaries.
“Let’s get real here,” McCain told The Hill. “There was never any outreach from President Obama or anyone in his administration to me.”
McCain disputes the notion that he has rejected entreaties to cooperate with the White House because he is bitter from his defeat four years ago.
He said he expressed eagerness to work with the president on immigration reform and the line-item veto, but has been left out in the cold.
McCain, the ranking Republican on the Armed Services Committee, also said Obama failed to consult with him on national-security issues.
“He never asked for advice on national-security nominees,” McCain said.
Shorter John McCain: “That guy I lied about and allowed my surrogates to call a terrorist for a year? He won’t treat me like his best buddy!”
What is it with our power elites and their incessant need to have their ego stroked?
cathyx
Egomaniacs seek the limelight. It’s just that simple.
Ash Can
This guy has issues. Thank goodness he wasn’t elected president.
Keith
Because the voters decided (by a considerable margin) that they wanted the other guy to pick national-security nominees (along with nominees for everything else). Jeez, talk about deluded.
Do losing coaches complain when the guy who won the Super Bowl don’t invite them to training camp to help coach their players?
jl
If McCain’s story is true, after his campaign performances on the Georgia/Ossetia crisis and the financial panic, I think his opinion on foreign policy and economics got the consideration it deserved.
If McCain’s story is true.
flukebucket
John McCain is a perfect personification as to why we need term limits.
dmsilev
Not only is he a bitter old man, eaten up from the inside by his own bile, he’s also a liar. Remember the great “White House Helicopter Issue”? For those who have mercifully forgotten, a refresher:
That’s a month after Obama’s inauguration.
Yutsano
@Ash Can: Grandpa Walnuts has been a bitter spiteful old man for a very long time now. But he gave a great barbecue. And he has a tire swing! Therefore: Village darling.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
Why do Republicans drive around in campaign buses honking to disrupt speeches? I think the same answer will apply to both.
FlipYrWhig
Don’t all the other Senators hate John McCain anyway, except for his fawning sidekick Lindsey Graham?
Chris
You had nothing to offer, jackass. Your entire party had made you the fall guy for the 2008 defeat, within a couple of years you were fighting for your seat against an Ideologically Pure teabagger upstart, had to tack even farther right in order to stay afloat and even then only won because Snowbilly Barbie deigned to go down there and campaign for you.
Just what kind of capital did you think you could bring to the table?
“Captain, V’Ger is a child. I suggest you treat it as such.”
“A child?”
“Yes, Captain.”
Egg Berry
Remember the health care summit discussion?
Good times.
Quaker in a Basement
What is it with our power elites and their incessant need to have their ego stroked?
Yeah. Who does McCain think he is? A columnist?
jl
On other hand, I remember Dub consulting with Gore often on…. on….
Hmmmm….
And after the election the Dub team showed such gratitude towards Clinton. Why I think the Dub administration issued an obscure formal report clearing the Clinton WH of the Dub administration’s own made up stories about sabotaging the transition.
Has Obama showed such grace under pressure? I think not.
Brachiator
Who was the other politician who had a similar whine earlier? Was it Snowe?
On the other hand, everyone likes an ego stroke now and then, and this is one of the ways that things get done in any political capital. And yeah, Washington is often like a high school when it comes to this stuff, a high school with big bags of money and nuclear weapons.
That Obama does not do this well is not the end of the world, but it is a vulnerability. Even the Godfather could have told you this.
Don Corleone: [shakes his head ruefully] Bonasera, Bonasera. What have I ever done to make you treat me so disrespectfully? If you’d come to me in friendship, then this scum that wounded your daughter would be suffering this very day. And if by chance an honest man like yourself should make enemies, then they would become my enemies. And then they would fear you.
Bonasera: Be my friend – Godfather.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Belafon (formerly anonevent):
.What the heck is Mitten’s thinking? That’s his own campaign staff doing it.
FlipYrWhig
@Yutsano: It’s because McCain has a decent sense of humor and, apparently, is uncensored behind the scenes. So if you’re a nerdy reporter who never had a chance to be cool, suddenly you’re getting to hang out with a guy with war stories and tomcat stories and he’s cracking jokes and using dirty words and not taking things too seriously. And he’d probably let you ride his motorcycle and sip his beer and when all the other kids find out they’ll be totally jealous. That’s the McCain phenomenon.
Jager
Whitehouse press conference. A Fox news reporter asks the President:
“Do have any response to Senator McCain’s charges that you’ve never reached out to him for counsel and advice?”
President responds:
“You know I did think about meeting with Senator McCain, I came as close as picking up the phone to call him. Then I thought how uniformed, unprepared and confused he was during the meetings on the financial crisis during the campaign and I said fuck it.”
BGinCHI
Obama’s reply:
Don’t take it so hard, John. There are a lot of dumbasses I didn’t reach out to.
JPL
May John McCain pinch Sally Quinn’s ass and
get off my lawn.
ChrisNYC
The wingy comments on the Romney bus tricks are perfect. They love it! They think it’s “bringing it” as the kids say. They are convinced Walnuts would have won in 08 if they had just done a lot of awesome pranks like driving a bus in a circle and honking its horn. (Metaphor?)
Yutsano
@JPL:
Too old. The replacement for Cindy can’t be over 35.
Xecky Gilchrist
@Jager: Then I thought how uniformed, unprepared and confused he was during the meetings on the financial crisis during the campaign and I said fuck it.
Ha, awesome.
Plus: “I should reach out for advice on national-security nominees to a man who picked Sarah Palin for a VP? Are you serious?”
karen marie
Says the guy who selected Sarah Fucking Palin for his vice-presidential running mate.
BGinCHI
@karen marie: And I bet she didn’t call him either.
FlipYrWhig
@ChrisNYC: Well, there was that whole prank of adding to the ticket a MILF with a mean streak.
Ben Cisco
I’m not entirely sure it’s his ego that needs stroking.
Steeplejack
@dmsilev:
Glad I read the comments before flaming. This was exactly the first thing I thought of: McCain ragging on Obama about his “expensive helicopter.” (McCain goes full crankypants at 0:35.)
Jeez, I can’t imagine why Obama hasn’t worked closely with him in a bipartisan manner over the last three years.
jl
@ChrisNYC:
” The wingy comments on the Romney bus tricks are perfect. ”
If voter turnout is high, then I sense the smell of big time Romney fail in the air. I don’t see most normal voters getting enthused by insulting juvenile tactics. I think the consensus estimates for normal voters at BJ hovers around 73 percent. So, I like those odds if most of the relatively normal voters are given an opportunity to vote (which looks more and more to be crucial issue in November).
Chris
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
Considering the uncontrollable rage that the very thought of Obama evokes in these people, I wouldn’t be surprised if they hadn’t been thinking at all, just saw an opportunity to say “fuck you Obama” and couldn’t bear to hold back.
jl
@Chris:
If the GOP is dominated by racial bigots, they may actually think that they can rattle Obama, and the ‘inadequate black man’ will fold under the nastiness and pressure, and voter suppression will do the rest of the work.
I fear the voter suppression, but I do hope they are operating under the (IMHO absurd) assumption that Obama is weak in that sense.
I am not an Obot, and I think that Obama is politically weak in how he has operated at times. But I would advise anyone who goes up against Obama that he is probably cooler, quicker, and smarter than than they are and to plan accordingly.
Maybe not anyone, but the exceptions that come to mind are all Democrats, most of them in the Obama administration.
Villago Delenda Est
McCain continues to disgrace the uniform he once wore.
Pathetic.
Villago Delenda Est
@Chris:
Wasn’t the SC primary about finding a candidate who would call Obama near to his face in the debates?
The blind racist rage is palpable.
Zach
Does he not understand how the Senate works? He sits on the relevant committees and votes on nominees. He’s got more say on this process than basically anyone else in the world other than Barack Obama.
Also, every time someone questions whether the economy might’ve been better off with President McCain than Obama (more stimulus even if it might all go to the rich would still be better) I wonder how much people realize that under President McCain at this point we’d have thousands of more troops in Iraq and probably be at war with Syria and have fairly active cold wars with Iran and Russia (we’re all Georgians!).
slag
Don’t take it personal. I’m sure President Yo Mama just doesn’t want to be accused of palling around with terrorists.
Cris (without an H)
To be fair, when John McCain was a young man, the runner-up got to be Vice President.
Djur
Maybe I missed the meeting of the Left where we decided this, but since when did we hope that McCain would be Obama’s ally? Who would have even expected that?
Egg Berry
Is it too soon to start questioning whether the man is going senile? or has a memory disease like St. Ronald Reagan?
Hal
Meghan McCain and Michael Ian Black were just on On Point this morning lamenting the lack of bipartisanship between the parties while promoting their new book. McCain specifically once again talks about how much the Dems just don’t seem to be willing to compromise, but maybe the Republicans don’t either, and can’t we all just get along? She doesn’t seem to have nearly as much a command of politics as you would think someone who has been around it her whole life. Or, maybe she’s just full of shit because she’s been around politics all her life.
Forum Transmitted Disease
Remember how Bush reached out to Clinton after the 2000 election?
Me neither.
Culture of Truth
The line-item veto? Shut the fuck up, old man
FlipYrWhig
@Djur: I was thinking the same thing. The best I can come up with is that a lot of people praised McCain’s concession speech, which hinted at the potential for constructive engagement after the inauguration. But that wasn’t The Left, that was the usual claque of media doofuses who think McCain is a “moderate” because he doesn’t talk about Jesus and is comfortable saying “fuck.”
Warren Terra
The line-item veto? The Supreme Court ruled fifteen years ago that the line-item veto can only happen by Constitutional Amendment. The President has fnck-all to do with the Constitutional Amendment process, which is up to Congress and then up to ratification by the states.
And some of us who were sentient in December 2008 can remember that Obama tried pretty hard to get McCain on side, at least in public – though I suppose we have to believe McCain when he says Obama wasn’t fellating him enough in private. Given that Obama’s entire operating philosophy was (and has for too long remained, in the face of evidence) Bipartisanship, McCain is clearly just a deluded bitter old man, lying to himself and possibly consciously lying to the reporter.
Jay in Oregon
McCain is apparently working on the delusion—shared by many conservatives and Villagers—that he’s the President-in-Exile of the USA.
You can’t point to ANY losing Democratic presidential candidate that gets the slobbering attention that McCain does. What, he’s still a sitting Senator? I’m sure John Kerry would LOVE to hear more about that.
I’m sorry that reality keeps slapping him in the face, but someone has to.
Culture of Truth
“He never asked for advice on national-security nominees
OMG Shut UP!
Chris
@jl:
Agree completely. I don’t think Obama’s weak except insofar as any Democratic candidate has weaknesses that the party’s had to compensate for for thirty or forty years – and he’s stronger than many of our candidates. (He’d have to be to get to where he is). People who underestimate him do so at their own peril.
Egg Berry
@Jay in Oregon:
Yes, he’s in exile in the country of Sundaymorningtalkshowistan.
Just Some Fuckhead
That whole stunt McCain pulled with former Soviet Georgia was good a reason as any not to seek his advice on foreign policy. And that was AFTER he became all somber and statesmanlike and stopped singing “Bomb bomb Iran” to the tune of Barbara Ann while giggling.
Haydnseek
@Jager: Yes. This. Along with a reasonable immigration policy that instantly dissolved into “just build the danged fence” when confronted with an attack from the far right by an insane teabagger with a radio show. He’s just a sour old asshole who gets instantly pissed off when challenged on his incessant lies/bullshit by the few members of the press with a shred of integrity. Yeah, let’s get old John’s take on whatever…yeah right.
David Koch
Maybe if McCain circled the White House in a bus, blowing his horn, people would take him seriously, oh wait..
Baud
You don’t bring me flowers
You don’t sing me love songs
You hardly talk to me anymore
When you come through the door
At the end of the day
I remember when
You couldn’t wait to love me
Used to hate to leave me
Now after lovin’ me late at night
When it’s good for you babe
And you’re feeling alright
Well you just roll over
And you turn out the light
And you don’t bring me flowers anymore
It used to be so natural
To talk about forever
But ‘used to be’s’ don’t count anymore
They just lay on the floor
‘Til we sweep them away
And baby, I remember
All the things you taught me
I learned how to laugh
And I learned how to cry
Well I learned how to love
Even learned how to lie
So you’d think I could learn
How to tell you goodbye
‘Cause you don’t bring me flowers anymore
Egg Berry
@David Koch: I have a better idea. Maybe he should take his boombox and stand in front of the WH gate playing Peter Gabriel.
gnomedad
@Jay in Oregon:
I thought Zombie Ronald Reagan was Permanent President-in-Exile.
FlipYrWhig
@Jay in Oregon: John McCain, Antipope.
Seanly
WTF? Ummm, not this leftie. Any journalist who still talks about McCain the Maverick reaching across the Great Continental Aisle is an idiot. Is the dude’s next article going to be about how great New Coke tastes?
dj spellchecka
i have a sad for poor john…now his feelings are hurt.
he was a p.o.w., remember? a p.o.w. did i mention that he was a p.o.w?
lacp
Fuck Poopdeck Pappy and the Moose Lady he tried to ride in on.
Ben Cisco
@Hal:
I think you may be on to something here…
Cap'n Magic
@karen marie: Bingo.
Evolving Deep Southerner
@Djur: I was thinking the exact same thing. Maybe I’m not really a true lefty, but I don’t remember – not once – thinking “You know, wouldn’t it be awesome if he was now Obama’s ally? We’ll be unstoppable.”
And thought I wouldn’t presume to speak for the Right, but I think it’s a pretty good bet that nobody “feared” it happening, either. “Oh my God, what if the old man turns on us? We’ll be fucked!”
This is just stupid for anybody to even be thinking about and stupid for anybody to have given this old fuckhead’s dodderings the time of day.
Patricia Kayden
Who the hell cares about McCain? Why should President Obama reach out to him for any reason? After he chose Palin as his running mate, he became persona non grata as far as I’m concerned. Did he really think that Ms. Palin was qualified to be a heartbeat away from the most powerful political office in the world?
Please!
g
I’m sure if I spent even five minutes googling, I could find plenty of examples of Obama reaching out to McCain during the first years of the term.