Did anyone else notice how, once Barack Obama began really getting under John McCain’s skin during the first presidential debate, McCain started calling upon the ghost of Ronald Reagan as part of every response? McCain channeled the spirit of the Teflon Communicator four times during the last third of the debate.
- Back in 1983, when I was a brand-new United States congressman, the one — the person I admired the most and still admire the most, Ronald Reagan, wanted to send Marines into Lebanon.
- The point is that throughout history, whether it be Ronald Reagan, who wouldn’t sit down with Brezhnev, Andropov or Chernenko until Gorbachev was ready with glasnost and perestroika.
- And we ought to go back to a little bit of Ronald Reagan’s “trust, but verify,” and certainly not sit down across the table from — without precondition, as Senator Obama said he did twice, I mean, it’s just dangerous.
- But in the case of missile defense, Senator Obama said it had to be, quote, “proven.” That wasn’t proven when Ronald Reagan said we would do SDI, which is missile defense.
But even Ronald Reagan can only take old school Republicans so far. What you really need to seal the deal is a reference to your prisoner of war status. Except McCain left out the “of war” part and made it sound like he had been released from the state pen.
Jim, when I came home from prison, I saw our veterans being very badly treated, and it made me sad.
So we have a potential drinking game for the last two debates: a swig every time McCain mentions Ray-gun, and a shot every time he says he was a POW. Who’s the designated driver?
Ironically, the Reagans hated John McCain.
Ye gods, I’m sick of Republican irony.