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Presidential Elections 2008
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| No | 61% | 109 votes | Total: 179 votes | |
| Yes | 39% | 70 votes |
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Add to FavoritesJohn McCain is 72. If elected, he will begin his term as the oldest President that Americans have ever elected. This puts some voters off. A Pew Research survey quoted in the New York Times shows 48% of voters say they are less likely to vote for a candidate in his 70's. But many world leaders have been older.
Eloquent Sir Winston Churchill, British wartime Prime Minister, took office at the age of 66. Faithful King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia has led his country since he was 72, dealing with problems related to population growth, aquifer depletion, and the transition out of an almost exclusively petroleum based economy. General Charles deGaulle was called back to serve a France in crisis at 68, and became the first President of the Fifth Republic.
Many other world leaders could be called old. President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt is 79. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh of India is 76. Indira Gandhi served until her death. No one can doubt the abilities of such as these.
Yet the stress of office itself promotes aging. A look at pictures of our former presidents shows aging far beyond the chronological norm during each man's term. The natural cognitive decline associated with aging itself is also a worry. The president will have advisers, but we want the country to be run by a person at the peak of his or her powers. Will John McCain still have the qualities the United States needs four years from now, or eight?
Youth has its virtues: vigor, drive, ambition and idealism. It has stamina. These are the virtues of soldiers, students, athletes, and leaders like Alexander the Great. Age has proved its stamina. It gave us leaders like Elizabeth I, whose reign saw the defeat of the Armada; it gave us most of the Catholic Popes.
Age brings wisdom, and the patience youth lacks. The old are cautious compared to the young, maybe that's how they've lived so long. The old are conservative, in the best sense they wish to keep what they have attained. These are valuable qualities in a president. We don't want a gunslinger.
To testify to his mental reserves, John McCain shows us his clever old mother. To show us his vigor, he hikes the Grand Canyon, down to the river and up again. We see his ambition and hear his idealism when he speaks. He proved his stamina in the prison camps of Viet Nam.
Some people will vote against John McCain because they don't like his position on Iraq. Others may be put off by his customary bluntness. Still others won't care for his position on immigration. Reasonable people can disagree. But nobody should vote against Mr. McCain because of his age. It's a point in his favor.
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http://campaignstops .blogs.nytimes.com/2 008/02/24/in-novembe r-will-age-
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Learn more about this author, Janet Grischy.
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Yes
John McCain has received my vote in every election he has been on the Arizona ballot-except this past primary. Yes, I even voted for him against Bush in the 2000 primary because he was a straight shooter whose ideas and goals seemed more in concert with those of the Constitution of the United States of America.
Unfortunatel y, the John McCain of 2000 no longer exists. In the past eight years he has dropped from being one of the best senators to perhaps (as evidenced by his abysmal voting record) the worst. Although bills he sponsored had high-sounding titles, applications of those bills have been deplorable. Perhaps the worst was "Campaign Finance Reform," which has done little to stem influence peddling by lobbyists. Another was the defeated "Immigration Reform" bill that didn't pass even though it could have been rephrased to alleviate the present immigration muddle.
John McCain also failed to support the newest GI Bill, perhaps the most significant piece of legislation since 9/11. His lack of support is a slap in the face of every serviceman and makes the Senator's continual claim that he supports the troops appear to be a hollow, bombastic lie.
The root cause of the difference between the John McCain of 2000 and 2008 is "age." The man (eight years younger than this writer) appears at times to be verging on dementia. He has called for "victory" in Iraq without defining what his idea of "victory" is. Clearly, the United States cannot win a political "victory" against the three major competing factions. We "won" that war when we captured and killed Saddam. We will "win" the war on terror when we capture and/or kill bin Ladenwho is clearly not in Iraq.
Although John McCain benefits from Medicare, he "fights" against medical care for children, who are the future of this countryeven though his personal "hero" and perhaps the greatest Republican who ever walked on this earth, Teddy Roosevelt, was the first major politician to propose universal health care.
For me, a presidential race is not about personality. If Obama and McCain both sent me an invitation to a barbecue held at the same time, I would go to John's. John and I share much in common: Age, Irish ancestry, Vietnam air warriors-I would even talk to John about the time I met and was immensely impressed by his father. We could even talk about how it hurts to get up in the morning or the multiple afflictions brought on by age.
As John's good friend Joe Biden has repeatedly said, John McCain deserves respect for what he endured-but that was over thirty-five years ago and John McCain is not even the same man he was at the beginning of this century. Our old nemesis, Age, has caught up with us, diminishing our eyesight, our hearing, the breath from our lungs, even the thoughts in our heads.
Learn more about this author, Earl Mcgill.
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