UPDATE: Now McCain is denying he ever said any of this, even though he said it on camera only yesterday AND in his denial today he repeats the claim that there are several "safe neighborhoods" in Baghdad, though he qualifies his statement by saying that they are very dangerous safe neighborhoods (I'm not kidding). So name those very dangerous safe neighborhoods. Not to mention, it's not very straight-talking to deny something you said on camera 24 hours earlier, and something you repeated on Bill Bennett's radio show. This is a man who wants to be president, and he is basing his justification for the Iraq war on a lie. Sound familiar?
(NOTE TO MEDIA: When presidential candidate John Kerry made a similar unsubstantiated claim - that several world leaders opposed Bush's re-election - you dogged Kerry relentlessly to name those leaders. Well fair is fair. If you're not all a bunch of conservative suck-ups, then do your job and demand the same answer from John McCain. Name those neighborhoods.)
GOP Senator John McCain, who is running for president, said yesterday that it's an absolute lie to suggest that Baghdad is unsafe. In fact, McCain says that there are several neighborhoods - more than one - in Baghdad (outside of the Green Zone, of course), that are totally safe for an American to travel alone with no security. Here's what McCain said:
“There are neighborhoods in Baghdad where you and I could walk through those neighborhoods, today."CNN's Baghdad correspondent, Michael Ware, who is actually IN BAGHDAD, says that McCain is flat-out wrong:
"Honestly, Wolf, you'll barely last twenty minutes out there. I dont know what part of 'Neverland' Senator McCain is talking about when he says we can go strolling in Baghdad."But John McCain was quite emphatic about it. There are "some neighborhoods" in Baghdad that you can travel around by yourself with no security and be perfectly safe. The only reason you don't know this, McCain told CNN yesterday, is because the media is lying to you.
Wow. Hell of a charge. McCain must know something that we don't. If McCain is right, if the media is lying to me, I want to know what the media is hiding. Won't you join me in asking Senator McCain to reveal to us the names of these non-Green-Zone Baghdad neighborhoods that are so darn safe that an American can travel alone with no security whatsoever.
Call John McCain now, and ask him to name that neighborhood.
(202) 224-2235
Then let us know what he said in the comments.
