A paper presented at:
The International Society for MacIntyrean Philosophy Second Annual Conference -
St. Meinrad School of Theology,
St. Meinrad, Indiana
"Theory, Practice and Tradition: Human Rationality in Pursuit of the Good Life"

The Presidential Candidates:
Agents of Change or 'Partners' in maintaining the Status Quo?

By
Richard Poirier
July 31, 2008

Abstract

Alasdair MacIntyre famously ends After Virtue by drawing qualified parallels between the conditions shortly before the Roman Empire's decline into the Dark Ages and conditions facing our own age in Europe and North America. One parallel is that people of good-will reach a turning point when they no longer believe that those in government possess civility and moral integrity - virtues that communities value. One difference he points out is that Rome's adversarial barbarians were "waiting beyond the frontiers," whereas the barbarians of today "have been governing us for quite some time." (AV p. 263) This notion that we are governed by barbarians provides a new frame of reference we may use in evaluating the two major party candidates currently running for president of the United States. This paper will examine five questions that may provide insight into today's political barbarians.

First, are those in political power maintaining a great public illusion that we have a representative government that protects and promotes the people's interests, while their only agenda is to instead protect and promote the interests of the ruling elite? Second, are opposing political candidates actually 'partners' - each needing the other as a target - in framing the ideological debate to limit public discussion of vital issues, thus maintaining the status quo as MacIntyre maintains? Third, are elections for real? Do we have real choices in elections such as voting for 'none of the above' or whether we agree to be bound by laws passed in our name? Fourth, do candidates really support a neutral state, a pluralistic society and the necessary environment in which individuals can pursue the good life? Fifth, has either candidate articulated what constitutes 'the good'? Is there any chance that, if promoted properly, such a view could reach a public consensus?

Every four years a number of highly ambitious Americans go through a ritual prior to the next presidential election. Most are members of the political elite who float trial balloons to friends and colleagues that they are considering a run for the presidency. Some are taken seriously, most are met with those knowing glances that translate into "go take a cold shower and then come to your senses." There are good reasons for their skepticism. Statistically it's a long shot at best. The amount of money, organization and political party support necessary for a viable campaign is prodigious. There are necessary personal qualities such as media and public relations skills, mastering political trade secrets, physical attractiveness, showmanship, personality and the proverbial 'fire in the belly' to physically and mentally go the distance.

But the biggest obstacle is that one must first be a member in good standing of the most elite club in the world. The private club that actually runs the world. This club comprises the bosses of both major political parties, many heads of fortune 500 corporations, organized labor, evangelicals, the American intellectual elite 1, members of the Council on Foreign Relations, and what Mark Halperin political director of ABC News and John F. Harris national political editor of The Washington Post, call the "Gang of 500" that include "columnists, consultants, reporters, and staff hands" 2 who write the candidates' biographical profile which introduces the candidate to the general public through media outlets. Others include wealthy private donators, bundlers, the heads of special interest group PACS, and high profile entertainment celebrities who fund the campaigns.

Regardless of one's high standing in this club, there are many members who think they have been waiting their turn longer and thus are more entitled to the club's vital nod of support. There are those who occasionally jump ahead of other members and go on to secure their party's presidential nomination. After the club's kingmakers conclude who has the best shot, within each party at winning the presidency, they commit their support to those two persons. Why do they do this? Because everyone prefers that a member of their own gang, Democrat or Republican, hold the reins of power for the foreseeable future. But regardless of which party's candidate wins the presidency, there is too much at stake in maintaining the established two party system for anyone to not go along with this 'universal understanding' accepted as a central tenet of their membership. This brings me to my first question.

Are those in political power maintaining a great public illusion that we have a representative government that protects and promotes the people's interests, while their real agenda is to protect and promote the interests of the ruling elite?

As much as we would prefer to believe that we have a political system comprising a president and citizen legislators that represent the people's interest, empirically in spite of Alexander Hamilton, John Jay and James Madison's fondest hopes that our country would function as a democracy, that dream never materialized. From the beginning of time there have been ruling classes that function as oligarchies. Some ruling class families' influence may be short-lived, others run for generations.

What all politicians know is to be a real player they must maintain their good standing with the ruling class. For in the end, no matter which party's candidate wins the White House, the only real 'change' that will happen is government will get bigger and spending will increase. It is simply a matter that its spending will switch from certain special interest groups to others. There will be no net gain in vital areas such as national poverty, illiteracy, public misconceptions, K1 through 12 education, health, crime or employment. These are not areas where government endeavors to make significant change. They are merely used as distraction topics in discussions. They are window-dressing for campaign speeches designed to maintain their base and attract uncommitted voters.

In the current presidential campaign we hear the call for 'change'. Change is a concept in which one must ask: Relative to what? How do we measure its desirability and efficacy? Naturally, there will be small changes. Corporations will have more or less regulation and, if more, will pass their regulatory cost on to the public in higher prices. Our national defense will be stronger or weaker, but we will survive the next inevitable terrorist attack. The variable will be how many innocent Americans die and how extensive the impact on our nation's infrastructure? Finally, there will be a smaller or larger increase in the proportion of our population the government incarcerates in prisons. As Alasdair MacIntyre pointed out in his book review in The Review Of Politics, March 2007 of Marie Gottschalk's: The Prison and the Gallows: The Politics of Mass Incarceration in America, 2006, "The United States imprisons both a larger proportion of its residents-citizens and others-and a larger number of such residents than any other society, present or past, in human history. And this is a recent phenomenon. In 1974, about 100 residents per 100,000 of the population were in state or federal prison. By 2001, the number was over 450." 3

These statistics do not include those incarcerated in county jails. In California the rate of incarceration has reached epidemic proportion. Its state prison system has a design capacity to house 100,000 inmates. It is currently housing 172,727 inmates. Three federal judges are calling it an unconstitutional overcrowding condition and are considering imposing a cap on California's inmate population. But we'll survive these 'cruel and unusual punishment' trends too, because most Americans are either in denial of the crisis or support harsh mandatory sentencing laws as a means of assuaging their own angry emotions generated from their life disappointments or a great personal loss.

So from the perspective of those running for president, the country will be fine regardless of their unfulfilled promises and the effects of new crises inevitably on the way. Capitalism will continue to fund the expanding welfare state and the voters will rebound from pie-in-the-sky campaign expectations. A presidential candidate's primary focus is to get elected, and once elected to maintain the political and economic interest of the ruling class. Failing to do so is the real definition of 'high crimes and misdemeanors'. This is the job-performance issue, in which the ruling class will not tolerate incompetence or pardon. Mere low public ratings are disregarded by everyone in the know as just part of the job description. Now on to question two.

Political Partners

Are opposing political candidates actually 'partners' - each needing the other as a target - in framing the ideological debate to limit public discussion of vital issues, thus maintaining the status quo as MacIntyre maintains?

This is a theme that MacIntyre has maintained since 1976, when I had him as a professor at Boston University, in a course entitled "Morals, Politics and the Emergence of Modernity." He revisited this concept in his 2004 Notre Dame online paper "The Only Vote Worth Casting in November." 4 To flush this concept out, let's consider the contrasting positions of Senators John McCain and Barack Obama. Their positions fairly represent the standing positions of the Republican and Democrat Parties for the last century. McCain claims he wants to reduce the size of government and lower taxes so that individuals can spend their hard earned money as they see fit. Obama wants to increase the size of government and taxes to provide government solutions for problems encountered by poorer members of society through a redistribution of the nation's wealth.

McCain views the war in Iraq as justified to minimize the growth of world terrorisms. Obama views the war as a drain on the government's resources. He sees tax revenues consumed on the war that could be better spent on new, liberal, domestic programs. Most of their speeches are less about what they will do as president than how terrible it will be if their opponent is elected. Most voters are more concerned about what will happen if their candidate is not elected than about how wonderful it will be if their candidate is elected. Some young, first-time, Obama supporters are an exception to this because they actually believe his speeches. Each candidate needs the other candidate as a target to justify their own ideas about how to save or change the country. MacIntyre once said that the Democrats' greatest fear is that the Republican Party will die out. Then the Democrat Party would have to split in two in order to have something to run against. 5

Now notice that when you listen to the rival arguments and debates of the two presidential candidates that they contain the same topics that both parties have been debating for the last century. What may appear to be new such as domestic oil drilling, environmental concerns and financial bailouts for the irresponsible are not new issues. They are just today's application of the same core party principles. The underlining core issues never change. They endear the party's base and anger the party's opposition. Thus, they give the illusion that a real debate is taking place. Obligatory promises are made. Lofty principles are alluded too. The candidates tell their audiences what polling says they want to hear. Polling and focus groups drive the message. The message is crafted into speeches by professional speechwriters. Important speeches are rehearsed and read from Teleprompters. Routine speeches are memorized as talking points. The golden political rule is to always stay on message. Everything, including televised debates, are orchestrated according to political trade secrete rules, agreed to by both candidates. MacIntyre, in his 2004 election paper, tells us that we should "resist the imposition of this false choice by those who have arrogated to themselves the power of framing the alternatives." 6 There are thus alternative arguments and solutions not discussed and issues not raised. Why? Because candidates know what is safe to discuss and what topics can lead to unwanted insight into the illusions created by government and the ruling class. This issue leads me to my next question.

Are elections for real? Do we have real choice in elections such as voting for 'none of the above' or whether we agree to be bound by laws passed in our name?

If a form of intelligent life from outer space was to visit earth and observe the voting ritual, they would find it very difficult to understand exactly what voters were doing. If they asked: What are you doing? The majority of voters would say from an ideological perspective and an individual choice perspective, we are choosing what we consider the lesser of two evils to be our leader. If asked: Why are you doing that? They would tell the space visitor that they have been conditioned to accept the fact that no candidate represents all of their views on important issue. So they have to select whichever one comes closest to many of their positions, and accept the fact that the person they vote for has vowed to engage in positions or actions they totally reject.

When asked why there are not candidates available who represent all of their view? The voter will say: I don't know. We always get the same incongruous choices. They only differ in their style of rhetorical exaggeration used to disguise their obscure ideological assumptions. Well maybe they wouldn't use those exact words, but that's what they would mean. The reality is that almost everything that both candidates say is superficial in content or half-truths. Complex issues are reduced to meaningless sound bites or slogans. Their speech is theater designed to induce fear, greed, security, patriotic fervor or hope in achieving what we call the American Dream. Thus, the moral integrity of political discourse has been transmuted into deceptive marketing.

When asked: Why do you vote? The voter will say: I really don't know. MacIntyre explains, "It has become an ingrained piece of received wisdom that voting is one mark of a good citizen, not voting a sign of irresponsibility." 7 But if we engage in voting to avoid experiencing induced guilt or if we vote merely out of habit like robots, are we acting wisely? In MacIntyre's 2004 paper he asks the question, what do we owe our children? His detailed answer concludes with the assessment that in 2004, neither a choice between Bush's conservatism and Kerry's liberalism were acceptable political alternatives for the needs he articulates for of our children. So he suggested we reject both candidates because "a vote cast is not only a vote for a particular candidate, it is also a vote cast for a system that presents us only with unacceptable alternatives." Thus MacIntyre states, "The way to vote against the system is not to vote."

Based on his reasoning, I think he would make the same recommendation between McCain and Obama. So, again I argue that nothing has really changed, but the new actors occupying the role of this season's presidential candidates. I suggest that a more effective way to demonstrate the public's disenchantment with unacceptable candidates is to deny them the appearance of majority support or a mandate for their proclaimed causes. A responsible, effective way to do this is to adopt a system that permits voters to vote for 'none of the above' on the ballot. Both major parties would naturally oppose this option because the majority of voters may very well vote for 'none of the above'. This would mean that the presidential candidate who wins would win with under 25% of the popular vote. This would seriously undercut the current illusion of majority or near majority support.

Given that we have so few choices in candidates or whether we agree with the views of the few who actually have any chance of winning office, the next issue, given these conditions, is whether the public should be bound by any of the laws passed in our name by those elected. Now there are those who will argue that we are all bound by a social contract that we mutually agree to in exchange for the protection afforded by societal-created civil rights. But when did anyone agree to this contract that entails subjecting themselves to any law that the federal or state government enacts. Any social contractualist theory, whether by Hobbs, Locke, Rousseau or Rawls, must address the question of individual consent or it is not a contract but coercion by those in power. Now MacIntyre acknowledges that there are some people who do agree to abide by the laws of the United States such as legally naturalized immigrants. I would add to that list those who are now judged guilty of violating current driving-under-the-influence, DUI, statutes, which determine guilt based on a politically motivated blood alcohol content criteria, rather than actual, impaired driving behavior. They are routinely forced to agree, as a condition of their probation, that they obey all laws of the United States. But barring these type of exceptions, Americans do not go through a process where they agree to assent to laws, as part of a social contract. Thus, for whatever reason that men have to obey the law, it doesn't derive from the promises they have made, which throws the whole presupposition of law and social order into question.

Locke tries to address this objection by using the notion of 'passive consent'. Now MacIntyre acknowledges that passive consent is not a meaningless notion. He illustrates that an example of it would be if during a committee meeting the chairman asks the participants if holding future meetings at 5 PM on Mondays would be acceptable to everyone. Nobody in the room says anything. So he says, well, okay, we'll have our committee meetings on Mondays at 5 PM. Still nobody says anything. Then later someone protests. And the chairman says, but you were there and you didn't say anything. The chairman is right. Under certain narrowly defined circumstances, if nobody says anything, their silence is passive consent. But nothing like that happens for almost everyone, in relation to the law.

Some try to rewrite Locke by supposing that in a democracy, because most have the opportunity to vote every two years, that everyone has passively consented to the law by their act of voting. That somehow they had the opportunity of consenting to or dissenting from the laws. But I would bet that no one has ever witnessed an election, in any country, in which one had the opportunity to vote on dissenting from all laws. In other words, you can't conjure out of the notion of consent any grounds for obedience to the law or accenting to moral rules, any more than out of contract. 8 Nor does the act of voting for a presidential candidate presuppose assenting to their future legislature initiatives. The act is simply choosing between what was offered on the ballot. Now let's turn to question four and five to consider whether MacIntyre's criticism of the modern liberal state's 'neutral view' on moral issues is supported by formal campaign statements by Obama and McCain.

Do candidates really support a neutral state, a pluralistic society and the necessary environment for individuals to pursue the good life?

Has either candidate articulated what constitutes 'the good' and is there any chance that, if promoted properly, such a view could reach a consensus?

MacIntyre argues that for there to be rationally, defensible moral and legal rules in a modern society, there needs to be a shared understanding of what constitutes 'the human good'. For the only way to defend moral and legal rules is to be able to define what they are to achieve; and that is 'the human good'. It follows that to use 'the human good' as the justification for society's rules and obtain public allegiance, there must be some publicly recognized rationally, justifiable conception of 'the human good'. MacIntyre describes an Aristotelian and Thomistic view of 'the human good' as, "The good for the members of each species is that end to which, qua members of that species, those members move in achieving their specific perfection. The rules for right action for rational animals are those rules intentional conformity to which is required if their specific perfection is to be achieved." 9 And what constitutes one's perfection? MacIntyre says that a "peculiar function of human beings as rational animals," ... is "the living out" of these rules. "Rules that the living out of which, the completion of which, lies in that activity which is itself supreme happiness and which makes of the life of which it is, the completion, a happy life." 10 Therefore, to not follow such rules would be to "separate oneself from one's good." 11

Now happiness is not a trivial human good. The American Founding Fathers took it seriously enough to classify it as one of the three unalienable rights in which government is instituted to secure. And if government becomes destructive to the ends of "life liberty, and the pursuit of happiness ... it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it and to institute a new government, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness." 12 I am of course quoting the American Declaration of Independence that articulates the purpose of government and its penalty if it fails to secure the people's unalienable rights.

Now, it is precisely MacIntyre's claim that a primary feature of the modern liberal state is to not align itself with any specific notion of what constitutes 'the human good'. Under the concept of a neutral state existing within a pluralistic society, liberalism proclaims that there are numerousand fundamental disagreements over the nature of the human good and whether there is actually any such thing as 'the human good.' Therefore, MacIntyre explains that it is a central tenet of modern liberalism that "institutions of government should be systematically neutral as between rival conceptions of what 'the human good' is. Allegiance to any particular conception of human good ought ... to be a matter of private individual preference and choice and it is contrary to rationality to require of anyone that he or she should agree with anyone else in giving his or her allegiance to some particular view." 13 To assess whether MacIntyre's description of the modern liberal state's view is representative of its practices, we will examine public statements of two of its primary representatives; the current presidential candidates.

There are two events in which Barack Obama has provided some specifics on his view of pluralism and public policy. In both instances he used the incompatible views on abortion as a way of explaining the larger topic of modern state policy in dealing with fundamental disagreements. The first occasion was a keynote address he delivered on June 28, 2006 at a Washington DC forum hosted by Sojourners and Call For Renewal, two Washington-based networks of evangelical social justice advocates. Obama talked at some length how Democrats can benefit by openly discussing the mutual suspicions that exist between religious America and secular America. He urged them not to rely upon the typical liberal response that we live in a pluralistic society. He said that progressives should not suddenly just "latch on to religious terminology - that can be dangerous. Nothing is more transparent than inauthentic expressions of faith." 14

But he goes on to say that "secularists are wrong when they ask believers to leave their religion at the door before entering into the public square. ... So to say that men and women should not inject their 'personal morality' into public debates is a practical absurdity. Our law is by definition a codification of morality, much of it grounded in the Judeo-Christian tradition." He then says "if we progressives shed some of these biases, we might recognize some overlapping values that both religious and secular people share when it comes to the moral and material direction of our county. We might recognize that the call to sacrifice on behalf of the next generation, the need to think in terms of 'thou' and not just 'I,' resonates in religious congregations all across the country. And we might realize that we have the ability to reach out to the evangelical community and engage millions of religious Americans in the larger project of American renewal." 15

He then describes the details of his political agenda which could lead one to consider that the purpose of being polite to religious America and encouraging them to speak out in the public square is not to be influenced by their ideas but to consider in what way that progressives can elicit their support under the veil of common interest to move Obama's agenda forward. To help religious America be more welcomed participants in public debate, he seems to contradict himself by warning them that "Democracy demands that the religiously motivated translate their concerns into universal, rather than religion-specific values. It requires that their proposals be subject to argument, and amenable to reason. I may be opposed to abortion for religious reasons," Obama proclaims, "but if I seek to pass a law banning the practice, I cannot simply point to the teachings of my church or evoke God's will. I have to explain why abortion violates some principle that is accessible to people of all faiths, including those with no faith at all. ... In a pluralistic democracy, we have no choice. Politics depends on our ability to persuade each other of common aims based on a common realty." 16

Obama's second event was at the Compassion Forum at Messiah College, in Pennsylvania on April 13, 2008. It was broadcast live on CNN. Obama's responses to questions mirrored his comments in his Keynote Address two years earlier. He began his response to the abortion question with the same typically structured Democrat pro-choice response. First, all views are important to consider. Second, we all agree we must do what we can to avoid unwanted pregnancies. A list of programs are enumerated. Third, if we do all these things, we can "take some of the edge off the debate." Next, he said, "We're not going to completely resolve it. I mean ... at some point, there may just be an irreconcilable difference. And those who are opposed to abortion, I think, should continue to be able to lawfully object and try to change the laws. Those of us, like myself, who believe that in this difficult situation, it is a woman's responsibility and choice to make in consultation with her doctor and her pastor and her family. I think we will continue to suggest that that's the right legal framework to deal with the issue." 17

During John McCain's 2000 presidential run he delighted secularists as the straight-talking maverick who said "Neither party should be defined by pandering to the outer reaches of American politics and the agents of intolerance, whether they be Louis Farrakhan or Al Sharpton on the left or Jerry Falwell or Pat Robertson on the right." He offended the GOP base and lost the Republican nomination to George W. Bush. An effective politician does not make the same strategic mistake twice. John McCain's chances of winning the presidency will depend upon including the evangelicals among his supporters. This reality likely influenced his decision to give the 2006 commencement address at Liberty University, the Lynchburg, Virginia institution of fundamentalism founded by Jerry Falwell. But what is interesting is his address didn't really appeal to religious values as Obama has done. Instead McCain appealed to the importance of American values to defend his decision for his support of victory in Iraq and doing whatever is necessary to stop the evil and hatred of Osama bin Laden and his followers.

After defending everyone's right to express dissenting opinions on Iraq he said, "I supported the decision to go to war in Iraq. Many Americans did not. My patriotism and my conscience required me to support it and to engage in the debate over whether and how to fight it. I stand that ground not to chase vainglorious dreams of empire; not for a noxious sense of racial superiority over a subject people; not for cheap oil; -- we could have purchased oil from the former dictator at a price far less expensive than the blood and treasure we've paid to secure those resources for the people of that nation; not for the allure of chauvinism, to wreak destruction in the world in order to feel superior to it; not for a foolishly romantic conception of war. I stand that ground because I believed, rightly or wrongly, that my country's interests and values required it." 18 With regard to abortion, McCain states on his website that he has consistently and strongly been pro-life. "I fully believe that Roe v. Wade is a flawed decision that should be overturned. Roe v. Wade is the most egregious example of judges who impose their own views by legislating from the bench rather than strictly rule what the Constitution says." 19

In conclusion, we see that whether the moral issue is abortion, just-war theory or any of the multitudes of contemporary moral and social issues, it appears that representatives of the modern state all publicly endorse public debate, but will pursue and enforce their own party's vision of the good. This calls into question whether we have a neutral state or just a dialectical conception of the human good that vacillates within the elite's ruling club. Its expression within government depends upon which political party happens to be in power at any given time. Based on this dynamic there will never be an enduring consensus of the good, nor a consistent necessary environment for individuals to pursue the good life. Given this conclusion, one might ask, why do people tolerate these conditions without any hope of change regardless of who is elected president?

The answer is that people resist changing their views and objectively observing reality because they fear experiencing the drama of a personal epistemological crisis that they believe they may not be able to handle. The elite understand this fear and may perpetuate the status quo to protect the people from their fear of facing reality or to perpetuate their own privileged standing within this complex interrelated arrangement. Either way, the rulers and the ruled need each other as participants to sustain the illusion that perpetuates the status quo. Unless people of good-will come to terms with their fear of real transformational change, and reach a turning point that translates into a critical-mass movement demand to dismantle the major two party system and replace it with new parties that represent the best of each __ namely strong fiscal conservatism and maximum liberal social freedom, consistent with a moral notion of the good, with minimal government involvement in people's daily lives __ unless this happens, then the new pragmatic Machiavellian barbarians who currently govern us, will be with us for generations to come.

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End Notes

1. Kadushin, Charles, The American Intellectual Elite. Boston: Little, Brown and Co., 1974.
2. Halperin, Mark, and Harris, John F. The Way To Win: Taking The White House in 2008. New York: Random House, 2006. p. 24.
3. MacIntyre, Alasdair, Poison Weeds, The Review Of Politics. 3/07. p. 319-322. A review of Marie Gottschalk: The Prison and the Gallows: The Politics of Mass Incarceration in America. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2006. Pp. xiii, 451.
4. MacIntyre, Alasdair, The Only Vote Worth Casting in November. Notre Dame Centre for Ethics and Culture, 2004
5. MacIntyre, Alasdair, "Morals, Politics and the Emergence of Modernity." 1976. Boston University. Richard Poirier's notes from course lectures by Alasdair MacIntyre.
6. MacIntyre, Alasdair, The Only Vote Worth Casting in November. Notre Dame Centre for Ethics and Culture, 2004
7. Ibid.
8. MacIntyre, Alasdair, "Morals, Politics and the Emergence of Modernity." 1976. Boston University. Richard Poirier's notes from course lectures by Alasdair MacIntyre.
9. MacIntyre, Alasdair, The Privatization of Good, An Inaugural Lecture in: The Review of Politics, University of Notre Dame, Summer 1990. p. 344.
10. Ibid.
11. Ibid. p. 345.
12. Thomas Jefferson, The Declaration of Independence, 1776, Great Books Of The Western World, American State Papers, Chicago, Encyclopaedia Britannica. 1952. p. 1.
13. MacIntyre, Alasdair, The Privatization of Good, An Inaugural Lecture in: The Review of Politics, University of Notre Dame, Summer 1990. p. 344.
14. Obama, Barack, Call to Renewal Keynote Address, Washington DC, June 28,2006. www.barackobama.com/2006/06/28/call_to_renewal_keynote_address.php
15. Ibid.
16. Ibid.
17. Obama, Barack, Barack Obama at the Compassion Forum, Messiah College, Grantham, Pennsylvania, April 13,2008. www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/04/barack_obama_at_the_compassion.html
18. McCain, John, John McCain's Liberty University Address, 2006. www.thecherrycreeknews.com/content/view/515/60/
19. McCain, John, John McCain on the Issues - Campaign 2008. The Washington Post. http://projects.washingtonpost.com/2008-presidential-candidates/john-mccain/