The news media keeps The news media keeps picking up John McCain's line about how he can "motivate all Americans to serve a cause greater than self-interest," a line I heard him use repeatedly in Florida last week. "Service" and a working for a cause greater than self-interest seems like a decent enough message -- one that Barack Obama has talked about often as well, pledging to increase funding for programs like Americorps and Peace Corps and improve infrastructure in those programs so more young adults can participate.
Yet when you hear McCain talk about it, you have to take with it the understanding that he's clearly emphasizing military service, which goes along with his talk about more, endless wars. He doesn't talk about improving or expanding service programs like Peace Corps and Americorps – though he does mention that he hopes more people will enroll in those programs -- he talks about expanding the military, and bringing more young Americans into that. For McCain, "a cause greater than self-interest" means war.
Which is why it's so laughable that McCain is somehow portrayed as less hawkish than his rivals, more anti-war. He's happy to start and maintain wars -- and he wants all of us to fight them. His "cause greater than self-interest" is the hawkish one. But instead of asking him about that, the press keeps letting him get away with benign-sounding rhetoric about getting all of us to hold hands, sing Kumbaya, and serve a higher power.
--Kate Sheppard
