Fox News Team, Posted Letter from Veteran Against John McCain

Fox News Team, Posted Letter from Veteran Against John McCain

The reason I have posted this is because the Fox news team has posted a letter from a so called veteran that has served in Iraq!  Well thats fine and dandy, but he is only one that running down John McCain’s voting record for veterans, there are many more men and women serving in Iraq besides this ONE that are not running down the military hero and veteran! Over at FactCheck.org I find that John McCain has a good record with veterans. I being one myself think that John McCain has been all out for us veterans and where Obama would not visit the military men and women in the hospital because he could not take cameras and the press inside for political reasons. Read below and decide for yourself about John McCain and his standings with the veterans!

This isn’t the same veterans letter that fox news posted today!  But its the one I found at FactCheck.org!

Scoring the Votes

He said that he had “a perfect voting record from organizations like the Veterans of Foreign Wars, the American Legion.” But we called both of those groups, and they told us they don’t even release congressional scorecards. In fact, the American Legion’s constitution prohibits it.

The veteran in this exchange was also wrong in saying McCain doesn’t have a perfect voting record with the VFW (since such a record doesn’t even exist). However, he is correct in that McCain doesn’t have a perfect score with DAV (Disabled American Veterans), a group of 1.3 million disabled veterans that supports more funding for veterans health care. McCain has a 20 percent record of voting the way DAV would like him to in 2006. The group is nonpartisan, but its 100 percent rankings disproportionately go to Democrats: 207 Democrats in Congress and only 13 Republicans received scores of 100 percent in 2006. Senators were evaluated on five votes for amendments that would have increased funding for veterans’ health care. an AFL-CIO ad that said McCain voted against increasing health care benefits for veterans, when McCain actually voted against Democratic measures but for alternative measures to boost funding by smaller amounts.

We don’t know to which of McCain’s votes this veteran was referring. But we’ll note that we recently criticized

Award Winner

McCain was closer to the truth when he said that he has “received every award from every major veterans’ organization in America.” He won the 1995 Congressional Award from the VFW and that is the only award the group specifically gives to legislators. In 1992, McCain also won the VFW’s Americanism Award, which is “awarded to an individual for outstanding contribution to Americanism principles.” Other past winners include former AFL-CIO President George Meaney, NFL Commissioner Pete Rozelle, actor John Wayne and the company FedEx.

Finally, McCain said that he has “been endorsed in every election by all of the veterans organizations that do that.” The two major groups McCain mentioned earlier – the VFW and American Legion – do not endorse political candidates. However, the VFW has a PAC that has endorsed McCain in every congressional race in which he has run since 1984.

The American Legion gives out a Distinguished Public Service Award, which McCain has never won. But he has won “at least three or four Legislator of the Year Awards earlier in his career” from the Legion’s Arizona office, according to state Legislative Chairman Paul Griffin. 

Update, July 15: We originally reported that the VFW PAC had endorsed McCain in every congressional election since 1992. Joe Davis, VFW director of public affairs, called us back to say that actually the PAC had endorsed McCain since 1984.

 Read more here at FactCheck.org

The veteran letter posted by fox news click here: Veteran Letter

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