Plea To The Mainstream Media — Can You Please Cut Off John McCain’s Mic?

On Friday, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) appeared on five different cable news shows to discuss the recent flare up of sectarian violence in Iraq and directly blame it all on President Obama and his administration. This all took place after McCain left a closed door security briefing on the situation in Iraq after only a few minutes in order to meet with reporters so he could tell them that Obama’s entire national security team needed to be fired, starting with the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Martin Dempsey. It is practically a given that McCain will appear on at least one Sunday news show, if not multiple, this Sunday.

At a certain point, the mainstream media has to cut McCain off. The man is addicted to media exposure. He doesn’t care one bit about any actual legislative work that is required of him as a Senator. All he wants to do is go on TV and complain about the current administration or call for the United States to invade yet another country. He can’t be bothered with actually attending meetings, hearing or briefings for information. As stated above, he left a briefing well before it was over so he could get in front of an open mic. That is par for the course for McCain. Heck, in November 2012, he held a press conference to complain about the lack of information regarding Benghazi while skipping a classified briefing ON BENGHAZI! You can’t makes stuff like this up.

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Any time there is some kind of incident or situation going on in the world, McCain finds himself in front of a television camera or reporter’s tape recorder. The man spends far more time making media appearances than he does actually legislating. Whenever he can find the time top make his way into the Senate chamber, he is usually making some speech calling for President Obama to bomb another country (McCain has called for military intervention in at least 15 other countries) or playing poker on his phone while sitting through a hearing. This man cannot and will not take his job seriously. He merely likes being seen as important, a ‘statesman’ and a foreign policy ‘expert’ who can use his position to get on TV anytime he wants. Which is, of course, all the time.

Since McCain spends so many hours of the day doing interviews, press conferences and finding reporters to ask him questions, it apparently leaves him precious little time to research his previous positions on certain issues. Therefore, he has contradicted himself numerous times and giving the appearance that he doesn’t actually know what he’s talking about and will only take a position that is contrary to the President’s at that given time. This week, McCain has complained about Obama pulling all American troops out of Iraq, per an agreement reached in 2008 between then-President Bush and Iraq’s leaders. However, in 2010, after a partial withdrawal, McCain seemed eager to congratulate the former President on the victory and the fact that combat troops had left Iraq. (Remaining American troops served in an advisory capacity and left at the end of 2011.)

Last American combat troops leave Iraq. I think President George W. Bush deserves some credit for victory.

— John McCain (@SenJohnMcCain) August 19, 2010

Prior to the transfer of prisoners that secured American POW Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl’s release, McCain took to the airwaves and called on the President to do whatever was necessary to bring Bergdahl home. He specifically pointed to the fact that there was a deal on the table that would exchange five Gitmo detainees, all members of the Taliban, and that he was comfortable with making the deal. After the exchange was made, McCain complained up and down that the President shouldn’t have made the deal due to the danger the five prisoners presented to the United States. The Washington Post’s resident fact checker, Glenn Kessler, stated that McCain flip-flopped on his position.

McCain has contradicted himself so many times that anyone trying to track his flip-slops has lost count. He was for cap and trade as far back as 2003 and bragged about it during his 2008 Presidential run. Fast forward to today and he’s not only completely against it, but he’s criticized Secretary of State John Kerry for mentioning climate change as a major challenge for the world. He’s flip-flopped on his position regarding immigration reform numerous times. He complained about Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) trying to push for the repeal of Obamacare, then stated that Obamacare needs to be repealed.

At this point, I don’t even know if I can hold McCain entirely responsible for this kind of behavior. The MSM needs to hold some level of responsibility as well. They are the ones who treat him as credible and present his opinions as valid. For the most part (there are exceptions) he is not pushed on his contradictions and contrarianism. He just gets away with it and is invited back, again and again and again. The Beltway media needs to realize that McCain is nothing more than a fool who makes everyone who listens to him dumber and less informed. It is time to cut off his mic and send him out to pasture.

Justin Baragona

Justin Baragona is the Managing Editor at Politicus Sports as well as Senior Editor at PoliticusUSA. He was a political writer for 411Mania.com before joining PoliticusUSA. Politically, Justin considers himself a liberal but also a realist and pragmatist. Currently, Justin lives in St. Louis, MO and is married. Besides writing, he also runs his own business after spending a number of years in the corporate world. You can follow Justin on Twitter either with his personal handle (@justinbaragona) or the Sports site’s (@PoliticusSports).