The real Walter Reed, this time

Walter Reed Hospital isn't allowed to be used by the military in a backdrop. This school had been used in west wing. It was stock footage by the ad man. McCain has been to Walter Reed dozens of times. Shame on this group. Obama had to take the press with him for publicity when he went. McCain has been there dozens of times.

Of course he has every intention to improve care at Walter Reed. If you could figure out what it is, he will indeed fix everything.

There is only one person right for the Presidency and that Is John McCain he is the only one that is qualified to run America Obama has no experience at all and Mccain does
Put it this way If we had another 9/11 who would you trust a person w/ Experience which is McCain or a person that has no clue on what he is doing,

1. McCain was a total obstacle toward extending benefits to vets with the GI Bill. He's got a nice little image there... but reality is reality.

2. If 9/11 happened again... what makes you think McCain would be better than Obama in office? McCain was one of the first people on the "go after Iraq" wagon after 9/11. Obama was the one that wanted to stay after Bin Laden.

Personally, I'd trust Obama on this. Two things that cemented this for me- McCain telling AIPAC that his plan for Iran was to launch a divestment strategy similar to what broke the Apartheid's back in South Africa. He voted AGAINST that just months earlier... it was the Obama-Brownback Bill! He was singing "Bomb Bomb Iran" at around that time. Second- I don't like that his chief foreign policy advisor has received more money from foreign governments to lobby for their interests while working for McCain than he has FROM McCain.

John "Abe Simpson" McCain couldn't find Walter Reed Hospital let alone fix it. And when his early senility get worse, we'll be left with the religious wacko, gun-nut he picked as his VP.

And if McCain died suddenly, Palin would be president with what experience?

One thing that I can not understand is how Senator McCain could have allowed Walter Reed Hospital to become so run down.

Has he not visited the soldiers thatwere being treated at the hospital until the issue hit the news Media or did he cut monies for the continued improvement of the hospital?

I thought that he,above everyone else, would have continued to fight for the best conditions and tretments for the soldiers.

Perhaps he can explain how these conditions deterioated obviously without his knowledge.

This is a silly flub, but imagine if the Obama campaign had made the same mistake. He would have been painted as out of touch, and only interested in these issues as a backdrop for posturing. I believe that Senator McCain genuinely cares about the military. I also think from all I have read he has no ability to put together a winning team that is set up for success. He has repeatedly changed decisions at the last minute and hung out his staff to dry when there were consequences. Rebuilding this set at the very last moment is just another example. It set up the team for a possible mistake, because the stage design for this high stakes speech was rushed.

Tenure in the Senate may mean experience, but experience is not the same as the fundamental ability to lead. That is why I am supporting Barack Obama.

Dan (comment #1) claims the McCain campaign couldn't use the picture of a military building on the screen at the Republican National Convention.

Well, then, he must of violated the law dozens of times with that video which showed all sorts of military stuff.

Dan, like many (most?) McCain supporters, is clueless. Of course, political candidates can use pictures of things military at political events.

LOL Incompetence from day one. Pathetic.

Don't forget that 9/11 occurred during George Bush's watch.
McCain wants to give greater tax breaks on a percentage of income basis to the rich and a lesser percentage to lower and middle income workers. 25% of all the tax benefits that McCain proposes will go to the top 1% wage earners!
When he thinks that you're rich when you earn $5 million or more per year and his wife wears an outfit worth $300,000+ to his acceptance speech, it's no wonder he has no idea what the middle class is going through. He appears before windmills in ads but he's repeatedly voted against alternative energy proposals!

As a country let's debate the issues - but the Republican machine wants to continually lie about Obama's tax plan. Is that what the Christian right does? Lies at any cost to win an election!!
For the record, I am a 61 year old Catholic white woman.

Actually Dan, Obama went to Walter Reed a number of times WITHOUT the press including multiple times during his primary campaign and before his trip abroad... Check your facts before you make ridiculous statements. He also visited military hospitals while in Iraq on his trip without press, but McCain didn't mention that part in any of his attacks. McCain only mentions that Obama didn't while in Germany... McCain also FORGOT to mention that military asked Obama not to. The problem is if anyone questions anything McCain does or says he immediately plays the POW card. To paraphase:

Sen McCain why didn't you support the modern GI Bill?
How dare you ask me that I was a POW!!!

If McCain visited so many times why did it take years for it to mention anything about the conditions. Thats not to single out him for blame because no one else mentioned it either; its to make the point that if you want to take credit for positives you have to take credit for negatives.

I thought that the backdrop was one of McCain's palatial spreads (don't most Americans live in sprawling villas?). It's even funnier that they couldn't even get their backdrops straight, considering image is more important than substance at the RNC. Of course, when questions arise, the first inclination is to lie. Par for the course.

Dear Paula, ( commentr number three)

We HAVE a president who has had no clue what his is doing ( GW Bush for the last eight years!). Bush, and his far right republicans used 9/11 to wage an inappropriate war. Now instead of the World' respect and friendship (which was as all time high right after 9/11) we are hated around the world more than ever by reasonable people ( and not just by terrorists). Do you want more of that? Then vote for McCain, and prove to the world, once again, that the US is really full of idiots who don't get it. I am certain we are smarter than this..

As a former military officer, I can assure you that Post #1 is correct that military facilities are not allowed to be used as backdrops for political campaigns.

Democrats are not caring for their Stars and Stripes.

McCain supporters rescued 12,000 miniature American flags from the site of Barack Obama’s nomination acceptance speech last Thursday, and redistributed the orphan flags to audience members ahead of a McCain rally in Colorado Springs on Saturday.

The flags were discovered by a vendor at Denver’s Invesco Field after the conclusion of the Democratic National Convention. The vendor supposedly found trash bags full of flags in and near garbage bins, and turned them over to the McCain campaign.

U.S. Code says the proper method for disposing of an American flag is actually burning, provided it is “no longer a fitting emblem for display.” These flags were in perfectly usable shape.

As the parent of a Walter Reed student, I can assure you no permission was given to use the school. Principal Donna Tobin placed a denouncement on the school website and ever parent was called with a recorded message from Ms. Tobin assuring us that Walter Reed Middle School has not, and will not, endorse any candidate for president.

Although Dan may want to brush this off to "stock footage," any one with any knowledge of the ad and entertainment business knows that footage would need to go through a process of clearance and permission (and money) would need to be given. The Republican Convention is a far cry from The West Wing, Dan needs to be careful about confusing a TV show with reality.

I would like to respond to Paula. If Obama had been President on 9/11 we would be in a much better position now nationally and internationally. He would have taken the information at the time, evaluated it intelligently and decided on appropriate action. Many, including me, feel that if Obama had been President there would not have been a 9/11 as he would have actually read and responded to the information in front of him. Then there would not have been the 4000 plus American lives lost, the 100,000 plus Iraqi lives lost nor the trillions and billions of dollars spent or misused in a war that has nearly bankrupt our country.
Not all experience is the same- and not all is appropriate for the job that has to be done. We keep touting McCain experience but if you take POW out of the conversation he has done very little for almost 3 decades. Palin of course- nothing at all.
Good judgement and intelligence however are crucial and McCain has none. This man admits to being at the bottom of his class at military academy and being a womanizer and party animal for much of his life. I am no prude but that is not the person that I want in the White House. I am tired of intelligence, education and achievement being a negative in this election - we are allowing the Republican party to say that we should shun these attributes in favor of mediocrity and failure.

Where was the experience when we needed it. Yeah, McCain probably has been to Walter Reed several times, but still votes negatively when the times comes to step up to the plate and assist our veterans. Lip service is cheap.