Think Again: Straight Talk Distress - Center for American Progress: "Think Again: Straight Talk Distress
by Eric Alterman
May 25, 2006
Back in 2000, Senator John McCain (R-AZ) called the Christian fundamentalist Jerry Falwell ''an evil influence'' on the Republican Party and an “agent of intolerance” in the American political discourse. These quotes have recently made a reappearance in history owing to McCain’s decision to give the commencement address at Falwell’s Liberty University in early May and the now-infamous appearance McCain made on “Meet the Press” a month earlier, when he disavowed those previous comments made six years ago.
Recall this is the same Jerry Falwell who not only hawked a video on television accusing then-President Clinton of murder and drug-running but two days after 9/11 explained, “I really believe that the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People For the American Way, all of them who have tried to secularize America. I point the finger in their face and say 'you helped this happen.'”
This, from a man who the “straight-talking” John McCain now thinks is no longer intolerant or destructive. But the bigger flap occurred last week when McCain gave essentially the same address at the New School in New York, in what some mainstream media pundits — who have been acted as unpaid publicity agents for McCain for more than a decade now — praised as a balanced approach, proving that McCain willingly takes on all comers. . ."
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