America pays tribute to hero, statesman McCain
WASHINGTON, D.C.: He was a hero, a
- ure in Washington. But for many in the increasingly angry world of American politics, John McCain will be missed for a far humbler virtue — simple civility.
As Americans and others paid tribute to the late Republican senator, who died Saturday of cancer aged 81, some cited a 2008 interaction with a voter as symbolizing his famous insistence on fair and civil discourse.
As McCain was campaigning against Barack Obama for the presidency, a gray-haired woman in a red McCain T-shirt told the senator at a townhall meeting that she could not trust Obama because he was an “Arab.” - rected her.
“No, ma’am,” he said, taking the microphone back from her. Instead, McCain described Obama as a “decent family man (and) citizen that I just happen to have disagreements with on fundamental issues.”
The video has gone viral, a seemingly quaint reminder in today’s famously combative political world that opponents can clash
respectful, collegial, even friendly. “This voice for civility, to put the country above your party, these are things he taught for years, and never more important than the last year,” his fellow Arizona Senator Jeff Flake
As one commenter put it on Twitter: “McCain’s passing feels like the end of a far from perfect, but more stable and civil era in American politics.”
The decline in civility — with the endless political smackdowns and full-throated insults — is not entirely new.
Nor can it be pinned on Donald Trump alone, although he seems
- ing descriptions of political foes.
McCain himself was known occasionally to snarl at rivals or to tell off-color jokes. McCain “had a temper the size of a volcano,” said Larry Sabato, director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia. But “you almost always got an apology, followed by quality time with him.”
And, while voting most often with his fellow Republicans, he “didn’t hesitate a minute to work with Democrats,” Sabato added.
McCain acknowledged in his recently published memoir, “The Restless Wave,” that he had “disagreed, sometimes too heatedly, with all of” the six presidents.