DFL Party to John Kline: Denounce Comments of Cindy McCain on PTSD

DFL Party to John Kline: Denounce Comments of Cindy McCain on PTSD
Christian Church
October 22, 2008
Cindy McCain´s comments sets back fight for veterans´ rights 30 years.

St. Paul — In a recent interview with Marie Claire magazine, Cindy McCain trivialized the ongoing struggle to recognize Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) as a significant combat injury. Her comments gained national attention just as Senator John McCain is visiting Representative John Kline´s hometown of Lakeville in Minnesota´s Second Congressional District.

In her comments, McCain stated that her husband did not experience cold sweats in the middle of the night because he "was trained to do what he was doing." McCain continued, "The guys who had the trouble were the 18-year-olds who were drafted. He was trained, he went to the Naval Academy, he was a trained United States naval officer, and so he knew what he was doing." [Marie Claire, 10/7/08]

Second District Republican Representative John Kline, a veteran himself, has a mixed record on the issue of mental-health parity for veterans, especially regarding the recognition of PTSD as a combat injury.

Minnesota DFL Veterans Caucus Chair Jim Bootz released the following statement:

"Cindy McCain´s callous comments regarding PTSD single-handedly set back discussions regarding the mental health of veterans nearly 30 years. Veterans returning home from combat with mental-health concerns such as PTSD need to know that their illness will be treated quickly and seriously, not belittled or dismissed. As Senator McCain travels to the Second District today, I call on Representative John Kline to denounce the comments made by Mrs. McCain.
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http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/78619

Cindy McCain made PTSD work worthless

I heard about Cindy McCain's comment on PTSD while I was away and it was infuriating. This just one example of how much harm what she said is doing to far too many.

Here’s the “one particular area” that was touched upon:

“MC: You met your husband after his POW days. To what extent is that still with you — or is it a part of history?
CM: My husband will be the first one to tell you that that’s in the past. Certainly it’s a part of who he is, but he doesn’t dwell on it. It’s not part of a daily experience that we experience or anything like that. But it has shaped him. It has made him the leader that he is.”

“MC: But no cold sweats in the middle of the night?
CM: Oh, no, no, no, no, no. My husband, he’d be the first one to tell you that he was trained to do what he was doing. The guys who had the trouble were the 18-year-olds who were drafted. He was trained, he went to the Naval Academy, he was a trained United States naval officer, and so he knew what he was doing.”
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http://www.opednews.com/articles/ACCORDING-TO-CINDY-
McCAIN-by-Stuart-Steinberg-081011-144.html

While trying to defend the fact McCain would statistically have PTSD from being tortured as a POW, just like the other 99% of victims of torture, she managed to insult everyone who is wounded by it.

Saying that McCain's training had anything to do with "preventing" him from developing it was a slap in the face to all veterans with PTSD and all the families who have watched them suffer. How dare she?

This pathetic excuse for a veteran's wife has just slandered millions including civilians who have PTSD. She also managed to push all the hard work that has been done since Vietnam to get rid of the stigma of it. She reinforced the view far too many ignorant fools have to even suggest if was her husband's "training" that made the difference. In other words, if a veteran has PTSD, it's their fault and the fault of their commanders for not training them right.

So what have all the years of fighting against people like her accomplished? This woman is reflecting the attitude her own husband has about PTSD. We've seen it long enough whenever another veteran even tries to talk to McCain about PTSD. She didn't come up with this absurd comment on her own.

Every veteran in this country should be sending letters to the McCain campaign demanding a full, public apology. Imagine the way this comment was received by some who were contemplating suicide when they heard this! Imagine a family left behind when someone they loved committed suicide over PTSD had when they heard this! It's like another stab in the back from someone who had the responsibility to find out what PTSD is and what causes it before she even opened her mouth.

Whistleblower breaks 15-year silence to allege McCain hid wife's drug abuse

Why now? Didn't the people of Arizona deserve to know what kind of person they were sending back to Washington to represent them year after year? If this was such an important story, then why be silent for 15 years? The only thing revealing this now does is show McCain as a man with a problem on his hands who didn't have a clue what to do about it. There are a lot of people across the nation facing the same problem with a family member addicted to drugs, legal or otherwise.

I make no secret of the fact I think McCain would be bad for this nation as President because of his voting record and the fact after he approved of all Bush did in office, he is now pretending he had nothing to do with any of it. Covering up, lying about his record along with Palin's record, that should be enough to alert the voters of what kind of damage he can do should he be elected. Telling blatant lies with a straight face effortlessly is not a good sign of the things he is capable of. To come out after all these years to say that he was fully aware of his wife's drug addiction is not hurtful to him, it is hurtful to his wife. She is not running for office, he is.

While this shows what went on behind what we already knew is valuable to gossip magazines, it serves no purpose to the nation. It will not take care of the veterans or the other problems this nation has. It will not stop the suffering of the poor and middle class. It just hurts someone who was hurting enough to be addicted to prescription drugs and the family.

There are a lot of families across this country doing the suffering with this issue. It would have been great if McCain had become a champion in substance abuse programs and Cindy had become an advocate for others suffering but they made the choice to not do it.

McCain has been a public figure since Vietnam and most of us are fully aware of his story, factual and otherwise. Palin, well she's new to the public's attention and her history needs to be known but Cindy, she's been in the spotlight far too long to drag all this back up now.

Whistleblower breaks 15-year silence to allege McCain hid wife's drug abuse
Nick Juliano
Published: Thursday September 11, 2008


Cindy McCain's addiction to prescription painkillers emerged into public view 14 years ago with a well-orchestrated PR campaign designed to preserve her husband's political future.

Aside from a lengthy contemporary investigation from Phoenix's alternative weekly and occasional mentions since then, the addiction back-story -- including ample questions about what John McCain knew, when he knew it and questions over whether he was complicit in the cover-up -- has gone largely untold. Until now.

Tom Gosinski, a former employee of the medical-aid charity Cindy McCain used as personal supplier of Percocet and Vicodin, is speaking out publicly for the first time.

On Wednesday, Gosinski sat down with RAW STORY and other outlets to tell his story and distribute copies of his personal journal from his time with the American Voluntary Medical Team in the last half of 1992, where he voiced ever more acute concerns and frustrations over McCain's drug use and its impact on her mood and job performance.

"My journal wasn't to trash Cindy or anything," he says. "My journal was kept b/c I came in contact w/ so many people. It was a way of keeping an ongoing biography of all the people I met, so I could refer back to it."

He says he can't buy the official McCain camp line that Cindy's drug abuse was kept from her husband, he saw and heard too much for any of their stories to make sense -- like the time Cindy was allegedly taken to the hospital after an overdose and John rushed in to berate the doctors and nurses there before moving Cindy to their secluded Sedona ranch. Then there were the Hensley family interventions and the fact that Cindy's drug abuse came to be something of an open secret among employees of the charity.

"I have always wondered why John McCain has done nothing to fix the problem," Gosinski wrote on July 27, 1992. "He must either not see that a problem exists or does not choose to do anything about it."
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McCain can't remember houses, wife can't remember sisters

Would that make this a reverse Cinderella story? Two step-sisters left out of the will?

Watchdogs make it harder for politicians to stretch the truth
Cindy McCain's past is the latest to be questioned after errors were found.
By Alexandra Marks| August 20, 2008 edition
Gilding the lily is nothing new to politics. From the 1840s when William Henry Harrison claimed to have been born in a log cabin (it was actually a Virginia plantation) to Ronald Reagan’s reminiscing about flying over Germany in World War II (he did, but only in a movie), politicians have taken perfectly good stories and embellished them.

This campaign is no exception. During the primaries, Hillary Rodham Clinton had to back away from claims she “ducked sniper fire” in Bosnia in 1996. Mitt Romney found himself having to explain how he “saw my father march with Martin Luther King,” when it turned out his father never marched with the Rev. Mr. King.

The latest embellishments come from the McCain camp. Cindy McCain has repeatedly referred to herself as an “only child.” This week came news that she actually has two half sisters, although apparently she had very little contact with them.

The McCain campaign had also put out the story that Mother Teresa “convinced” Cindy to bring home two orphans from Bangladesh in 1991.

Mrs. McCain, it turns out, never met Mother Teresa on that trip. (Once contacted by the Monitor, the campaign revised the story on its website.)
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Linked from RawStory