Stephen F. Kislock, III – 9/23/08

This page was last updated on September 25, 2008.

McCain is living in past; Stephen Kislock, III; Beaver County Times; September 23, 2008.

Most of Mr. Kislock’s 30+ letters over the last four years have been Republican-bashing exercises.

Below is a detailed critique of the letter.

“When Sen. John McCain was asked about his current homes (seven), he could not give an answer.”

[RWC] There’s no question Mr. McCain didn’t handle this non-issue well. That said, who really cares about how many houses a candidate owns? The last I heard, the McCain family owns eight. They live in two condos (One in DC and the other in Phoenix), one is provided for an elderly aunt, one was purchased for one of their daughters, and the others are investment properties.

According to Politico.com, “Sen. McCain himself does not own any of the properties. They’re all owned by Cindy McCain, her dependent children and the trusts and companies they control.” I suspect it’s the fact Mr. McCain doesn’t personally own any of the properties that caused his fumbling on this point.

“He does, however, start to recall events of the 1960s and ’70s. As a celebrity guest on the late night talk shows, it’s the same story: Asked about something current, he starts recalling things out of his past.”

[RWC] As usual, Mr. Kislock is really hard up for things to attack. This whole letter is based on slips of the tongue during interviews.

“McCain shares a lot in common with his friend and mentor, President Bush. Neither one knows the difference between Shiite and Sunni.”

[RWC] President Bush is Mr. McCain’s “friend and mentor?” On what planet does Mr. Kislock live? Regardless, does Mr. Kislock actually expect anyone but an idiot to believe Messrs. Bush and McCain don’t know “the difference between Shiite and Sunni?”

“McCain presents himself as a man with a world of foreign experience. Yet he has referred to Czechoslovakia, several times. Czechoslovakia dissolved in 1997 into the Czech Republic and Slovakia.”

[RWC] Yep, this certainly disqualifies someone from being President. I’ll bet Mr. McCain even occasionally refers to Burma instead of Myanmar and Ceylon instead of Sri Lanka.

“McCain may know where Iraq is, but no, senator, Iraq is not on Pakistan’s border. That seems to be McCain’s knowledge of the Middle East.”

[RWC] Sure. Mr. McCain was referring to problems on Afghanistan/Pakistan border and mistakenly said Iraq. Trying to claim Mr. McCain believes Iraq and Pakistan share a border is like trying to claim Barack Obama believes there are at least 57 states in the U.S. and is a Muslim because of his slips of the tongue.

What about Joe Biden claiming “When the stock market crashed, Franklin D. Roosevelt got on the television and didn’t just talk about the, you know, the princes of greed. He said, ‘Look, here's what happened.’” For the history challenged among us, the stock market crash occurred in October 1929 and FDR didn’t become President until January 1933. Further, TV wasn’t introduced to the public until 1939.

“McCain said recently the U.S. economy is ‘strong.’ Talk about living in the past. Since Oct. 9 until last Friday, $4 trillion has been lost in total market capitalization.”

[RWC] Mr. McCain actually said the economy fundamentals were strong and that’s true.

“Do you want this man answering the 3 a.m. call on the red phone and thinking it’s 1973?”

[RWC] Where did 1973 come from?