At the top of 2016 GOP presidential polls, 69-year-old New York real estate mogul and reality TV star Donald Trump took aim at sacred cows, including Senate Armed Services Chairman John McCain (R-Ariz.). “He’s not a war hero,” Trump told GOP pollster Frank Luntz, referring to McCain. “He’s a war hero because he was captured. I like people that weren’t captured, OK? I hate to tell you,” Trump clarified, referring to McCain’s five-and-a-half-year captivity during the Vietnam War. Most politicians tread carefully on military service, especially because Trump never served. Working the press like a lion-tamer, Trump with whip-and-chair-in-hand, caused a media hubbub, drawing more publicity than a carnival snake oil salesman. Shot down Oct. 26, 1967 in his Navy A-4E Skyhawk over Hanoi, McCain’s harrowing survival, capture and torture are legendary.
Taking on Washington’s establishment, Trump pits himself as an outsider, the only type capable of rocking the entrenched interests that has given the country years of counterproductive gridlock. Trump blames McCain for fairing so poorly as a GOP presidential candidate against President Barack Obama in 2008. While McCain made plenty of mistakes, including picking former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, whom McCain routinely called the “future of the Republican Party,” beating Obama, after former President George W. Bush pushed the country in a deep hole economically, was next to impossible. NBC’s “Today Show” host Matt Lauer pushed Trump to apologize for criticizing McCain’s military service. “I said very clearly he is a war hero. I have absolutely no problem with that,” said Trump, refusing Lauer’s attempt to get Trump to publicly apologize for criticizing McCain.
Chasing juicy stories, journalists sometimes lose the big picture, that Trump has an over-arching media strategy, branding himself as the only true outsider in a crowded 2016 GOP presidential field. While running as a Republican, Trumps wants independents and crossover Democrats to see that he doesn’t fis into no Party boxes. Ripping McCain, one of the beltway’s most entrenched politicians, proves that Trump spares no prisoners when it comes to running for president. While many 2016 candidates have differences with McCain on key aspects of foreign policy, they don’t question his military service. Trump was his sarcastic self when he said he preferred to reserve the title of hero for military personnel not captured. When Trump backtracked, admitting McCain was indeed a hero for doing time in Hanoi’s Hoa Lo Prison, the media kept running the story.
Several 2016 presidential hopefuls asked Trump to exit the presidential race for his politically incorrect statements. Trump declined, explaining they want him out because he leading the race. Former Gov. Rick Perry reacted harshly to Trump’s McCain remarks, saying the real estate mogul wasn’t fit as commander-in-chief. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), former Gov. Jeb Bush, former NY Gov. George Pataki and Sen. Marco Rubion (R-Fl.) all took Trump’s bait denouncing his criticism of McCain. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), a close friend of McCain, said Trump hit the Republican Party with a “wrecking ball.” Asked by MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” with former Rep. Joe Scarborough (R-Fl.), if Trump owed him an apology, McCain said “no.” While saying Trump should apologize to military families, McCain accepted his political position putting him in harm’s way.
Going after McCain earned Trump the same publicity he gets when telling a reality show participant on his TV show “The Apprentice,” “you’re fired!” More like P.T. Barnum than a ordinary carnival barker, Trump’s antics have won him the GOP’s anti-establishment vote. “I’m in the arena as [Teddy Roosevelt] used to say,” said McCain, grateful at age 78 he remains one of Washington’s most frequently quoted, photographed, televised and recorded politicians. Trump’s critics don’t see the method to his madness, garnering him so much publicity that he’s risen to the top of the GOP heap. Democrats watching Trump’s shenanigans can barely contain their glee, hitting the Republicans Party, as Graham says, with a wrecking ball. Going after McCain proves Trump fears no one, certainly not entrenched GOP politicians that have pushed the wrong economic and foreign policy agenda.
Stirring the Washington pot, Trump proved to anti-establishment Republicans, Democrats and independents, that no one’s immune to criticism. His beef with McCain stems from losing to Obama in 2008 but, more importantly, his positions backing former President George W. Bush on the Iraq War, causing ongoing problems in the Middle East. “The reality is that John McCain, the politician, has made America less safe, sent our brave soldiers into wrong-headed foreign policy adventures, covered up for President Obama with the VA scandal and has spent most of his time in the Senate pushing amnesty. He would rather protect the Iraqi border than Arizona’s,” Trump wrote a commentary in USA Today. When Trump explains himself, he gets cheers from disgruntled voters, tired of “more-of-the-same” politics promised with the politically correct crowd of the Republican and Democratic Parties.
