An Open Letter To The McCain Campaign
Dear Senator McCain:
Your convention was themed “Country First.” You had a day of that convention devoted to “service.” You have pledged to fight the “me-first” crowd in Washington.
But after watching your campaign the past several weeks, I must ask: are you putting country first? Have you asked for service? Or have you employed me-first tactics to the detriment of our nation and to get yourself elected president?
Putting country first would have your campaign engage Obama on real issues such as health care, housing, the economy, the environment, energy, education, Iraq, and Iran, and then letting the voters decide. Instead, we’ve gotten policy-less accusations of “celebrity,” mock outrage about lipstick, and deliberately deceptive innuendos about sex education for kindergarteners. Is this what your campaign calls putting country first? Or is it the ultimate expression of “me first”: that it’s OK to say anything as long as it helps you to get elected?
I would be thrilled to see you and Obama really discuss the problems that matter to Americans so they can make informed decisions that should constitute the foundation for our democratic process. To me, that would really be putting the country first. But I don’t know how you can look at the warping of your opponent’s positions and say you’re really willing to let the people reach their own conclusions. You’ve repeatedly said that Obama will raise “your” taxes. If “your” means “everyone,” then you must know that your statement will be wrong as applied to at least 80% of the public. Is that distortion putting country first? Why is there such fear to honestly describe your plan and Obama’s plan and simply argue why you think your plan is better?
Nor do I see from your campaign any call for real service. Your budget plan calls for more tax cuts, but there are no proposed budget cuts that come close to paying for them and you do not ask the public what they might be willing to give up to satisfy their desire for lower taxes. Instead, you seem to pretend that everything will be free; but do you truly believe that such a path leads to anything but economic ruin? Even more pointedly, you call for an extended military presence in Iraq but you have not asked the public for an iota effort to really support our troops: we have not paid for them so far, and there are no plans to pay for them in the future. As a military man yourself, I though that you would have the courage to say that if we send our troops to war, the very least we could to is pay for it. Instead, we have borrowed the money and not paid a dime ourselves; indeed, we have been lavished with tax cuts, and you have promised still more. Is this your idea of service, that we should be fine with letting a tiny fraction of the population bear all of the risk and sacrifice while we contribute less and less to their effort and send the bill instead to our children?
It seems to me that your proposals are anything but country first and almost entirely me-first. They pretend that wars are free, that tax cuts are free, that we have to do nothing to get the things we say we want. They ask nothing of us. Instead, they play along with the fiction that we can have everything while doing nothing. That approach may get you elected, but it is inadequate for governing because it is unsustainable. And promising the public something that is not sustainable is not putting country first; it’s putting our nation’s future at terrible risk.
Democrats are not blameless on these matters. I disagree with their proposal to expand children’s health insurance by taxing smokers: if that issue is something we care about, we should care enough to do something about it ourselves and not sluff off the responsibility to others. Nor are Democrats pure on the attack ad front, as I know that some of your statements have been taken out of context.
But at least Obama has asked some of us for action. He is asking those of us who are wealthy and have done so well over the past eight years to pay a little more in taxes so that the vast majority who have not benefited can have some tax relief. He is asking those of us who are serious about energy independence to make some changes in our own lives to help achieve that goal. By contrast, you now support maintaining tax cuts for the wealthy even though you previously opposed them as unfair, and you mocked suggestions that people take such small but easy steps such as properly inflating their tires to reduce oil consumption. I fail to see how either of these positions are put country first or asked any of us for the slightest bit of service.
So I ask you if you are serious about “country first” and “service.” If you are, you will stop your campaign’s rapid downward mud-slinging spiral and focus on the real and serious problems we face today. And you will talk about not only your goals for the nation but honestly tell us what we as individuals will need to do to achieve those goals.
I know politics is a rough sport, and I don’t expect purity from either side in this election season. But someone who has adopted the themes of “country first” and “service” must be able to do better that what we’ve seen so far. Otherwise, those terms will be nothing more than ironic as punch lines that you never meant seriously in the first place. I think the American people deserve better.
Don’t you?
