Arizona Senator and murderous psychopath John McCain is rumored to be at death’s door, and already the world is being admonished by high-profile empire loyalists not to voice any criticism of his blood-saturated, obnoxiously long career.
“Anti-McCain twitter seems to have reached new heights (or depths) of repulsiveness,” tweeted Iraq-raping PNAC founder Bill Kristol to thunderous applause from #Resistance Twitter. “In the hope that a few of the haters see this, let me say: I’m proud to have voted for John McCain for president three times (2000 & 2008 primaries & 2008 general), and for Donald Trump…never.”
“John McCain reminds us that American greatness is made by those who understand that character is the sum of one’s hardest choices; that reality is not a TV show; that fame is mist but honor granite; that heroes don’t need fixers on retainer,” the Washington Post‘s David Von Drehle preemptively eulogized in a nauseating article titled “John McCain isn’t the ideal messenger. He’s the ideal message.”
“STFU, Trumpites,” scolded the somewhat less subtle Matt Lewis of the Daily Beast. “John McCain is 50 times the person you’ll ever be.”
Anti-McCain twitter seems to have reached new heights (or depths) of repulsiveness. In the hope that a few of the haters see this, let me say: I’m proud to have voted for John McCain for president three times (2000 & 2008 primaries & 2008 general), and for Donald Trump…never.
— Bill Kristol (@BillKristol) May 6, 2018
Other commentators have had other ideas.
“These repressive decrees prohibiting criticisms of John McCain as he dies are like those who insist gun control not be spoken of after mass shootings,” tweeted journalist Glenn Greenwald. “Discussions of his life are inherently political. If you’re going heap praise on & sanctify him, you can’t also silence critics.”
“Insisting on the right to convert every US political leader into a heroic & noble saint upon death, while condemning critics as gauche & classless, is propaganda,” Greenwald added. “It’s easy to dismiss all the deaths McCain has caused because they’re distant and invisible, but they still matter.”
https://twitter.com/ggreenwald/status/993464149727473664
I would take it a few clicks further, personally. I say it is the duty of everyone who opposes acts of mass military slaughter for power and profit to cheer loudly and unapologetically when John McCain dies.
We should all celebrate McCain’s death. Not in a spirit of vengeance for the lives his relentless warmongering has helped end. Nor because his death may save innocent lives, though that possibility is surely an added perk. No, we should celebrate the end of McCain’s despicable life first and foremost to prevent such bloodthirsty depravity from being normalized, or worse, immortalized as heroism.
Many people will recoil from such a notion in horror, like the pearl-clutching ladies on The View did when discussing my article “Please Just Fucking Die Already” which I wrote about McCain shortly before his cancer diagnosis. These people are cowards. They have compartmentalized themselves away from the horrors that McCain has helped inflict upon this world because it is more psychologically comfortable than acknowledging that such a pervasively evil presence has been working so intimately with the nexus of power in their country.
If everyone could be forced Clockwork Orange-style to look at all the death, destruction and suffering that John McCain has helped inflict upon our species, they would feel nothing but relief upon his departing from this world. It is only the aforementioned power to dissociate and compartmentalize which enables people to spew nonsense about McCain being a hero and a good man.
It is this pocket of compartmentalization that we are being bullied into by establishment loyalists who demand solemn reverence for this unforgivable monster simply because his time here is almost up. They are doing this because it benefits and protects them. The ability of the servants of empire to proudly show their faces in public after helping to ensure the deaths of countless thousands of human beings is absolutely essential for the survival of the Orwellian oligarchy which rules over us. If we could see these murderous beasts for what they truly are, the illusion would be shattered and we’d never consent to being ruled by a system which empowers them.
To truly see John McCain for what he is and what he has done is to see the face of the oppression machine that rank-and-file Americans have been manipulated into supporting. The empire which spends medicine money on bombs overseas and insists on an economic system that is propped up with the barrel of a gun depends on keeping its most hands-on servants normalized and celebrated. Mainstream Americans seeing McCain clearly will also be seeing themselves and what they’ve been duped into consenting to. Rejecting this illusion and pissing on McCain’s grave is a direct act of rebellion against the oppressive, war profiteering oligarchs and their allied defense and intelligence agencies.
The reason the US-centralized war machine is able to get away with unleashing unspeakable horror after unspeakable horror upon our world is because that war machine has become normalized and celebrated. So it is therefore our duty to call John McCain the wicked witch that he is and celebrate like munchkins when he dies.
In a healthy world, war-peddling neoconservatives like John McCain would be treated with the same social stigma as child molesters and serial killers. So let’s create that world.
Abnormalize war. Abnormalize the campaigns of mass slaughter for power and profit by the US-centralized war machine. Abnormalize the system which tries to normalize John McCain.
Normalize peace. Normalize an expectation that leaders will not advocate war at every opportunity. Normalize an environment where someone seeking out opportunities to push for war will be recoiled from in horror like the demonic freaks that they are. Normalize a world with no John McCains.
Oppose the calls of the social engineers for reverence and good behavior. The war machine is not entitled to our politeness. McCain’s family is not entitled to force the entire world to pretend that he wasn’t an evil child-killing monster. We need to drag this abomination out into the light where everyone can see it and call it what it is.
When the time comes (hopefully sooner than later), join me in celebrating John McCain’s death. Here’s to a world where such vile ghouls are treated like what they are.
____________________
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23 responses to “Why You Should Celebrate Loudly And Unapologetically When John McCain Dies”
Caitlin I love you.Best article EVER.Totally agree.You were brave enough to write what many millions were thinking,and we all cheer you.If Mccain is hoping for an”amnesty”from Hell I’d say he has as much chance as the peoples and cultures he destroyed around the world(foremost America’s).Hope Mccains section of Hell has lots of Mexicans so he can eat tacos and worship the cult of death(Santa Muerte) with his beloved for eternity.Bravo Caitlin.Keep up the superb writing.
Homicidal maniacs who are not condemned as such but instead celebrated as saints and heroes have been with us since time immemorial. Genghis Cunt and the prophet of a certain religion come to mind.
It is things like this that seriously make you wonder if humanity is not a lost cause. As the Bible says, “The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked.” (Jeremiah 17:9) You don’t have to be a Christian to see the wisdom in these words.
the fuck did Genghis khan and the one who shall not be named cause you’re a pussy do to be compared to this conservative fuck
cause okay you sound like the person this article talkin about
you cant preach a religious text whilst talking shit about another religion.
seriously look at yourself first before making comments like that cause both the people you cited as examples only did what they did(cause of a divine wtf and environmental pressure)
I’m not concerned about one dead cockroach but the thousands of others spread across the planet. They’re intergenerational; they breed, well, like cockroaches. Most can be found in the usual suspected places: the US, Israel, the UK, France, Germany and other lesser lights. Yes, lights. Shine the light on these foul creatures and they scatter to the hidden places.
Recall that after the first nuclear bomb test in the Jornada del Muerto [Journey of the Dead Man] desert in 1945 scientists found that the only thing that survived were: you gessed it: COCKROACHES!
There are so many of McCain’s ilk that still roam the Earth that his demise would only be a drop in the bucket. I understand your disgust of his legacy, but there won’t be much time for celebrating when we have torturers, war-mongers, planet rapers, human trafficers and drug lords in our government.
My only concern is what his dark energy will transmute to in it’s next reincarnation.
We in the USA are responsible for these creeps. We elected them, we buy there products. We bribe them or take their bribes, or accept their intimidation. It is our system that inflicts this suffering on the world. For a long time no one in the USA paid attention, i was over there. But now re freedoms are disappearing, Patriot Act, police state, surveillance state, bill of rights infringed, middle class broke,… tax system and expenditure system both gamed for the rich. Crony capitalism, anti-environmental corporatocracy, debt, spend now, pay later…
9/11 just a cover-up or inside job? — why does no one discuss this anymore? we need to know for the cure to come
foreign aggression, homeland oppression, debt, the highest incarceration rate in the world… we have lost our way in the USA
Let’s regime-change them though, because we govern ourselves so well
let’s regime-change them, because we govern ourselves so well
I tried to watch the “pearl clutching” video but only got a few minutes in. Anyway, thank for your great work, oh CJ. Your work is a candle in the darkness, and we need you now more than ever.
Bravo, extremely courageous, edgy piece. Can you imagine a list? I’d nominate George HW Bush – Kennedy assassination, bank jobs, 9/11, disparity between rich and poor, counter-productive spending and taxation… celebrating the deaths of sneaky, self-serving oppressors. Maybe you got the idea from Barbara Bush, that disgusting feeling you get when others are celebrating, heaping on praise, and you are muzzled. Madame Defarge though, I don’t think it could possibly catch on. It reminds me of trying to take on the phrase, “thank you for your service,” so fashionable today.
There is a whole list of people that the planet would be better off not having. I personally would vote for George W bush, The Butcher of Iraq. God only knows how many civilians and children he killed in his quest to conquer Iraq which turned out not to work after all. He committed genocide and he is a war criminal and he needs to be in prison at minimum. Not painting shitty art and pretending that he did nothing wrong.
I find it distasteful when people stand outside a prison gate and joyfully celebrate the execution of a serial killer. That said, I do believe John McCain is more of a serial killer than an American hero. Living part time in Arizona I have for many years been shocked how many of my Democratic friends heap praise on this monster. Democrats are so freaked out by the presidency of nasty Donald Trump that they seem blind to how bad other Republicans are. It made me physically ill to see Keith Olberman apologize for having criticized George W Bush.
Nevertheless, as much as I admire Caitlin Johnstone (my favorite blogger), this article is in bad taste, mostly because it consists of nothing but name-calling. Caitlin mentions nothing specific. A better article would have given condolences to McCain’s family and then outlined specific reasons why his career is nothing to celebrate. I do not look forward to the coming national day of mourning. I do not look forward to all-day live coverage of his funeral with endless encomiums by famous people. I’d rather eat dirt.
Brilliant, Larry Gates. Thank you for your lucid take.
Thank you Ms. C.
Thank you. We need to be constantly reminded the aberrations we live within.
I didn’t need convincing about that son of a bitch. Of course, I never saw the twitter post, because I have neither time for, or interest in, a Twitter account.
Bluntness becomes you Team Caitlin – and makes absolutely clear that warmongers are responsible for the deaths of innocents – and no matter their later lives – without proper repentance and action against military-industrial-political complicities – there can be no redemption – no heaven. (High Distinction awarded by retired teacher me!)
Caitlin, you left out one of McCain’s greatest sins: he foisted Sarah Palin upon the nation, and Palin, as much as any major political figure, made it OK to be stupid and bigoted and a liar. There is a direct line connecting McCain, Palin and Trump.
Some people need to die. Had McCain died before he was able to drop tons of high explosives on Vietnamese freedom fighters and civilians, there would be that many more people in this world today who had not been murdered. He can die and die in pain for all I care – and soon.
NO moral person should wish death on another. I respect your opinions and have spoken with you on Twitter, but utopia can never be achieved as long as people wish others harm and celebrate the death of another. We should celebrate life and spread joy not doom and gloom. Think about how your words hurt his family even if you don’t like him
Even if that other person has not only wished, but brought and then celebrated death on thousands of others? You kinda like mean Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini? We should not have hoped for and celebrated their deaths?
But that’s the biggest fantasy bubble that needs to be punctured–that the US is the big hero of the world, saving freedom and democracy everywhere their military operations go. They ‘saved’ Iran, they ‘saved’ Libya, they ‘saved all of south america from democratically elected left wing governments with CIA backed coups, etc etc. The fantasy has been peddled so long on mainstream TV that to speak up and tell the truth seems abrasive, but it’s only because the viewers of The View are viewing through rose colored addictions to a pompous self glorification and denial of reality. Facing reality is hard at first, but they really do need to get over their self righteous superiority complex, especially Whoopi Goldberg.
This is not “wishing death”. This is glorious relief that a killer will kill no more.
So no moral person should wish death on another–even if the other has done a helluva lot worse than wishing death on others, he made it happen, to thousands, and he profited from it. Is that worse than wishing he would hurry up and die in an online news article? How many people died as a result of her article? Zero. How many people died because of McCain? AND he revelled in it, gloried in it, cut your social services while doing so. But we can’t say we wish he would hurry up and go away so that less people might die and suffer on account of his bank account? You Americans need to start taking off your rose colored addiction to self aggrandizement. You need to stop this expectation of sycophancy from the media and from anyone at all. It is time we all stood up and spoke truth to power instead of being spineless cowards being told what to think and how to act by a bunch of airheads on morning tv shows. $$%^%$&$%!!!!
I’m not going to read this, because I already know.