Obama for President......Octagram! ( Archived) (762)

I believe you will find, since you have a knowledge of mental health, that as men age they generally become more mellow and introspective. Come on Dude....you learned that in Psych 101.

Phoenix New Times, March 25, 1999 -- Two former POWs, Air Force Colonels Ted Guy and Gordon "Swede" Larson, said in a feature article that while they could not guarantee that McCain was not physically harmed, they doubted it. Both Guy and Larson were senior ranking officers (SRO's) in McCain's POW camp at a time he claims he was in solitary confinement and being tortured.
Larson told the New Times, "Between the two of us, it's our belief, and to the best of our knowledge, that no prisoner was beaten or harmed physically in that camp [known as 'The Plantation'].
"My only contention with the McCain deal is that while he was at The Plantation, to the best of my knowledge and Ted's knowledge, he was not physically abused in any way. No one was in that camp. It was the camp that people were released from."


McCain starred during the 1991-93 proceedings of the Senate Select Committee on POW/MIA Affairs.
Boston Globe, June 21, 2003--- "In the ensuing weeks and months , McCain and Kerry individually, and then together, concluded that the unresolved divisions of the Vietnam War were causing too much national anguish, and that it was time to put the war to rest.

Four years later, on a summer day in 1995, Kerry and McCain stood beside President Clinton in the East Room at the White House as he announced that the United States would normalize diplomatic relations with Vietnam. For a president who most famously had not served in their war, the two combat veterans served as wingmen.

In his work toward that day, Kerry earned the ‘unbounded respect and admiration’ of McCain, who, like others in the Senate, originally viewed Kerry with suspicion. ‘You get to know people and you make decisions about them,’ says McCain. ‘I found him to be the genuine article.’

". . . At hearings where McCain's anger at his critics flared, Kerry would reach over and place his hand on McCain's arm to calm him down. "I remain grateful to him for doing that," McCain acknowledges.

" . . . Ultimately, he crafted a report stating that while there may have been POWs unaccounted for and possibly left behind, no proof existed that Americans were still being held.

"Together, McCain and Kerry then led the effort to normalize relations with Vietnam. ‘The work John Kerry and John McCain did’ is ‘truly one of the most extraordinary events we have had in the last 50 years,’ says Edward M. Kennedy, who has served in the Senate since 1962."


During the hearings, he worked hand in hand with his Sen. John Kerry, the panel's co-chairman, to discredit voluminous evidence indicating that Vietnam was still held a sizeable numbers of U.S. servicemen alive after the prisoner return in 1973.
McCain stood out because he "always showed up for the committee hearings where witnesses were going to talk about specific pieces of evidence. He would belittle and berate these witnesses, questioning their patriotism and otherwise scoffing at their credibility. All of this is on record in the National Archives . . . "
When, on Nov. 11, 1992, McCain was advised that Dolores Apodaca Alfond, chairwoman of the National Alliance of POW/MIA Families (her pilot brother, Capt. Victor J. Apodaca, is missing in action in North Vietnam), was offering some testimony that was critical of the Senate Committee, he rushed into the room to confront her.
Award winning journalist Sydney Schanberg described the scene. "His face angry and his voice very loud, he accused her of making "allegations ... that are patently and totally false and deceptive." Making a fist, he shook his index finger at her and said she had insulted an emissary to Vietnam sent by President Bush. He said she had insulted other MIA families with her remarks. And then he said, through clenched teeth: "And I am sick and tired of you insulting mine and other people's who happen to have different views than yours."
By this time, tears were running down Alfond's cheeks. She reached into her handbag for a handkerchief. She tried to speak: "The family members have been waiting for years -- years! And now you're shutting down." He kept interrupting her. She tried to say, through tears, that she had issued no insults. He kept talking over her words. He said she was accusing him and others of "some conspiracy without proof, and some cover-up." She said she was merely seeking "some answers. That is what I am asking." He ripped into her for using the word "fiasco." She replied: "The fiasco was the people that stepped out and said we have written the end, the final chapter to Vietnam." "No one said that," he shouted. "No one said what you are saying they said, Ms. Alfond." And then, his face flaming pink, he stalked out of the room, to shouts of disfavor from members of the audience.
McCain took the lead in demanding a U.S. Justice Department investigation of POW/MIA families and activists accusing them of fraud because in some of their fund-raising literature they claimed the U.S.
government knowingly left U.S. POWs behind after the Vietnam War and that some remain alive today.

McCain told reporters, "The people who have done these things are not zealots in a good cause. They are the most craven, most cynical and most despicable human beings to ever run a scam." The Justice Department did investigate the POW/MIA families and activists finding NO scams or reasons to charge anyone.

The SPOTLIGHT November 15, 1999
McCain is famous in POW-MIA activist circles for his clashes with those who disagree with his conclusion that no American POW or MIA was left alive in communist hands when he was repatriated by the Hanoi government in 1973.
Perhaps the best example of his crude treatment of the loved ones of still-unaccounted-for POWs and MIAs is illustrated by an incident that occurred in 1996 when the senator's path crossed with a number of POW-MIA family members outside of a hearing room in Washington.
Upon leaving the room, McCain immediately quarreled with family members, who were eager to question him on the issue. Instead of answering their questions, the Arizona senator pushed and shoved them out of his way, nearly toppling the wheelchair of POW-MIA mother Jane Duke Gaylor, whose son, Charles Duke, a civilian worker in Vietnam, is among the same 2,300 American POWs and MIAs still unaccounted for by the communists.
The Duke case file contains sufficient evidence that Duke was a prisoner of the communists, according to Garnet "Bill" Bell, who headed the U.S. government POW-MIA office in Hanoi.
The POW-MIA activists, shocked and horrified by McCain's crude behavior toward Mrs Gaylor, registered their complaints with Senate officials. Mrs Gaylor and her niece, Geannette Jenkins, who was pushing her wheelchair, were advised by Sgt. Dana Sundberg of the Capitol Hill Police to file assault charges against McCain. They declined, fearful of the power of the Arizona senator.

Interesting.

Intelligence is only effective against the other side of course if its obtained within the 1st 24 hours.It's now standard practice to stall for 24 hours before telling them anything, as the command knows they will crack and it is their duty to protect their own life.

Most special forces troops also undergo some basic preparation for what will happen when captured.

Much like Joe Leibermann ?

That's a good thing. Sleep like a rock!