McCain “Obit Omit”: In His Own Words

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Today on the program “Democracy Now,” Institute for Public Accuracy Executive Director Norman Solomon criticized coverage of the death of John McCain as taking part in an “obit omit.”

Following are some parts of McCain’s record that have been ignored or underplayed.

Making the case for the Iraq invasion:

“We can make the case that it is obvious that Saddam Hussein continues this buildup of weapons of mass destruction, including nuclear weapons. But we are not the ones who are forcing this issue. The President of the United States in this resolution is not forcing the issue. It is Saddam Hussein who is forcing this issue.” (Oct. 8, 2002, textvideo)

On the Iraq invasion:

“I believe that success will be fairly easy.” (Sept. 24, 2002, CNN)

“I don’t think it’s, quote, ‘easy,’ but I believe that we can win an overwhelming victory in a very short period of time.” (Nov. 29, 2002, CNN)

“The American people … were led to believe that this would be some kind of a day at the beach which many of us, uh, fully understood from the very beginning would be a very, very difficult undertaking.” (Aug. 22, 2006, CNN)

“I knew it was probably going to be long and hard and tough. And those that voted for it and thought that somehow it was going to be some kind of an easy task, then I’m sorry they were mistaken. Maybe they didn’t know what they were voting for.” (Jan. 4, 2007, MSNBC)

McCain’s top career political funders (from OpenSecrets.org) :

Merrill Lynch
JPMorgan Chase & Co
Citigroup Inc
AT&T Inc
Goldman Sachs