For REAL?

An excellent counterpoint to yesterday's dialogue.

Thanks to alert blogger MAdM for sending this along. Cheers to Professor Gamel for recording this for posterity.

"MY HOLIDAY WITH JOHN McCAINIt was just before John
McCain's last run at the presidential nominati on in
2000 that my husband and I vacationed in Turtle
Island in Fiji with John McCain, Cindy, and their
children, including Bridget (their adopted
Bangladeshi child). It was not our intention, but
it was our misfortune to be in close quarters with
John McCain for almost a week, since Turtle Island
has a small number of bungalows and their focus on
communal meals force all vacationers who are there at
the same time to get to know each other intimately.He
arrived at our first group meal and started reading
quotes from a pile of William Faulkner books with a
forest of Post-Its sticking out of them. As an
English Li terature major myself, my first thought
was 'if he likes this so much, why hasn't he
memorized any of this yet?' I soon realized that
McCain actually thought we had come on vacation to be
a volunteer audience for his 'readings' which then
became a regular part of each meal. Out of
politeness, none of the vacationers initially
protested at this intrusion into their blissful
holiday, but people's buttons definitely got pushed
as the readings continued day after day.
Unfortunately this was not his only contribution to
our mealtime entertainment. He waxed on during one
meal about how Indo-Chine women had the best figures
and that our American corn-fed women just couldn't
meet up to this standard. He also made it a point
that all of us should stop Cindy from having dessert
as her weight was too high and made a few comments to
Amy, the 25 year old wife of the honeymooning couple
from Nebraska that she should eat less as she needed
to lose weight.McCain's appreciation of the beauty of
Asian women was so great that David the American
economist had to move his Thai wife to the other side
of the table from McCain as McCain kept aggressively
flirting with and touching her. Needless to say I
was irritated at his large ego and his rude behavior
towards his wife and other women, but decided he must
have some redeeming qualities as he had adopted a
handicapped child from Bangladesh. I asked him about
this one day, and his response was shocking: 'Oh,
that was Cindy's idea – I didn't have anything to do
with it. She just went and adopted this thing without
even asking me. You can't imagine how people stare
when I wheel this ugly, black thing around in a
shopping cart in Arizona . No, it wasn't my idea at
all.' I actively avoided McCain after that, but
unfortunately one day he engaged me in a political
discussion which soon got us on the topic of the
active US bombing of Iraq at that time. I was shocked
when he said, 'If I was in charge, I would nuke Iraq
to teach them a lesson'. Given McCain's personal
experience with the horrors of war, I had expected a
more balanced point of view. I commented on the
tragic consequences of the nuclear attacks on Japan
during WWII –- but no, he was not to be dissuaded. He
went on to say that if it was up to him he would have
dropped many more nucle ar bombs on Japan. I rapidly
extricated myself from this conversation as I could
tell that his experience being tortured as a POW
didn't seem to have mellowed out his perspective, but
rather had made him more aggressive and vengeful
towards the world. My final encounter with McCain
was on the morning that he was leaving Turtle Island.
Amy and I were happily eating pancakes when McCain
arrived and told Amy that she shouldn't be having
pancakes because she needed to lose weight. Amy burst
into tears at this abusive comment. I felt fiercely
protective of Amy and immediately turned to McCain
and told him to leave her alone. He became very angry
and abusive towards me, and said, 'Don't you know who
I am.' I looked him in the face and said, 'Yes, you
are the biggest asshole I have ever met' and headed
back to my cabin. I am happy to say that later that
day when I arrived at lunch I was given a standing
ovation by all the guests for having stood up to
McCain's bullying. Although I have shared my McCain
story informally with friends, this is the first time
I am making this public. I almost did so in 2000,
when McCain first announced his bid for the
Republican nomination, but it soon became apparent
that George Bush was the shoo-in candidate and so I
did not act then. However, now that there is a very
real possibility that McCain could be elected as our
next president, I feel it is my duty as an American
citizen to share this story. I can't imagine a m ore
scary outcome for America than that this abusive,
aggressive man should lead our nation. I have
observed him in intima te surroundings as he really
is, not how the media portrays him to be. If his
attitudes toward women and his treatment of his own
family are even a small indicator of his real
personality, then I shudder to think what will happen
to America were he to be elected as our
President.--Mary-Kay GamelProfessor of Classics,
Comparative Literature, and Theater ArtsCowell
CollegeUniversity of California, Santa CruzSanta
Cruz, California 95064831-459-2381 (office);
831-429-8803 (home) mkgamel@ucsc.edu"