Topic: Newsmax
In a June 3 Newsmax video, Barry Farber rehashes his May 16 Newsmax column in which he claimed that a MoveOn.org ad quoting John McCain John McCain "saying he doesn't care if America is in Iraq for a hundred years or a thousand years or ten thousand years" is "awful" and "dirty politics," adding:
Obviously the perpetrators of that ad do not believe John McCain wants that raging war killing American troops on and on and on. Obviously he's saying he has nothing against a situation like Germany, Japan, South Korea, Kuwait, England, Italy, etc. where American troops are peacefully billetted and non-violently engaged.
Farber makes the same point in his video interview with Newsmax's Ashley Martella:
FARBER: Every thinking person -- now, there are too few left in America -- every thinking person knows good and well that what John McCain meant was he has nothing against remaining in Iraq indefinitely as long as there's no fighting and no dying. American troops have been in Germany and Japan since 1945, in Korea since 1950, they're in over 20 other countries around the world. I would have something called political malpractice, and I'd like to get the formulators of that ad in the witness chair and I'd like to say, "Can you show me one moment of your life where you ever opposed in any way American troops in Germany, in Japan, in Italy, even in Kuwait, in Bosnia, in Alb" -- no, there's no fighting, there's no dying, but the clear intent of that ad is to make people think, "Oh, my lord, John McCain doesn't care if this awful war goes on for 10,000 years." That is the dirtiest ad of my lifetime.
But Farber doesn't mention that McCain himself has said that a Korea-like long-term occupation of Iraq by the U.S. is not possible "because of the nature of the society in Iraq and the religious aspects of it."