SENATOR JOHN S. McCAIN III, 1936-2018: REQUIESCAT IN PACE

"John McCain was born to fight. He did so in the skies and fields of war, in Vietnam, and in politics, soaring to become the Republican Party’s presidential nominee in 2008. His death at the age of 81 robs America of one of its most distinctive public servants of the last half century. In both his chosen careers, McCain fought against authority and conventional wisdom, acquiring the reputation of being the quintessential maverick. Although in many respects a rock-ribbed conservative, he always had his own agenda, regardless of party affiliation. Even when fellow Republicans occupied the White House, he had few compunctions in challenging them. He was raised a navy brat. Born on August 29, 1936, in the US-occupied Panama Canal Zone, he was the son and grandson of US Navy admirals, moving wherever his father was stationed. He graduated from the US Naval Academy in 1958 after a turbulent midshipman’s existence, accumulating so many disciplinary demerits that he qualified for the dubious “century club”. As a navy pilot, he found himself in Vietnam. He survived a terrible fire in 1967 on the USS Forrestal after an onboard missile exploded, killing more than 120 US seamen. In an early indication of his independent thinking, he told a reporter he had befriended, R W Apple, then covering the war for the New York Times: “Now I’ve seen what the bombs and napalm did to the people on our ship, I’m not so sure I want to drop any more of that stuff on North Vietnam.” Soon afterwards McCain was shot down over North Vietnam and spent five and a half years in the prison known as the “Hanoi Hilton”. He was repeatedly tortured, to the point that his sandy hair turned snow white, but refused the offer of early release to stay with his fellow prisoners of war. After peace was agreed he returned to the US a hero, broken in body but not spirit. Once mended he resumed his navy career at home but it became apparent he would not become the third admiral in his family. One stint, as a liaison to the US Congress, proved useful, however. When he married his second wife, Cindy Lou Hensley, in 1980, his best man and groomsman were two senators, William Cohen and Gary Hart. The couple moved to Arizona, where politics soon beckoned. McCain ran for the House of Representatives in 1982 and, when attacked in a debate as a carpet-bagging newcomer to the state, he came up with a killing response: “When I think about it now, the place I lived longest was Hanoi.” He won easily and moved up to the Senate four years later. The maverick reputation took hold in his House years. He voted against the Ronald Reagan administration on two controversial issues: to establish a permanent US Marine presence in Lebanon and to override a presidential veto of anti-apartheid legislation. His Senate career was nearly derailed by being caught up in the savings-and-loans scandals of the late 1980s. One suspect bank to go bankrupt was Lincoln Savings and Loan, led by Charles Keating, an Arizonan financier and old friend. Five senators, including McCain, were alleged to have tried to intercede with federal regulators investigating Lincoln. He was reprimanded by the Senate ethics committee but still won re-election in 1992…. McCain broke with President Bush frequently, first over his 2001 tax cuts, which McCain opposed because they were not accompanied by corresponding reductions in spending. Though he supported the invasion of Iraq in 2003, he was the pre-eminent congressional critic of the conduct of the military occupation, saying he had no confidence in President Bush’s then secretary of defence, Donald Rumsfeld. McCain’s case was that Rumsfeld insisted on deploying too few troops. He was vindicated with the eventual adoption early in 2007 of the troop “surge”, which at least had the effect of reducing American and Iraqi casualties. Never one to mince his words, the senator regularly cast aspersions on Donald Trump’s fitness for the highest office in the land…He let the White House know that Mr Trump would not be welcome at his funeral, which was planned, appropriately, for the National Cathedral in Washington".

Courtney Weaver, "John McCain, US war hero and politician, dies aged 81". The Financial Times. 26 August 2018, in www.ft.com.

>HORATIO: "I saw him once. He was a goodly king". HAMLET: "He was a man. Take him for all in all. I shall not look upon his like again".

Shakespeare, Hamlet. Act 1, Scene 2.

The late Senator John McCain was to my mind without any doubt a heroic figure. Someone like Maréchal Ney: the bravest of the brave. In retrospect it was and is a tragedy of the first order that he never was elected President. Especially, in year 2000. Which is not to say that I agreed with everything that Senator McCain did or said. Simply that as a man, as a political figure, he was by far the best person by both family background and life story to ascend to the highest office in the land. It is a mark of the current decadence of American politics and indeed the American polity, that to-day the office of the Presidency is held by someone who is in almost every way and or fashion possible the exact opposite of Senator McCain. Indeed, I fear that the mots of Shakespeare in Hamlet are very apt in this instance: that we "shall not look upon his like again".