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A McCain – Edwards Ticket

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August 11, 2008

As mid-August approaches, the Hillarologists are preparing to descend upon Denver to vent their spleens at the Democratic Convention.  We’ve seen videos of them at backyard parties, cheering for their fallen hero, and shouting out for … uhh … catharsis?  As their hearts filled with rage, visions of sexists danced in their heads:  the usual big-mouths who weren’t used to restraining themselves while making on-air comments.  Most of the liberally-inclined men I know, couldn’t understand the charges of sexism in media coverage of the Presidential campaign, as alleged by Clinton’s supporters.  That’s because these men don’t watch Fox News or the likes of Glenn Beck.  Had they watched Keith Olbermann’s Countdown program a while back, they would have been treated to a sampling of some ugly, sexist remarks, as rebroadcast to an audience who, for the most part, tended to avoid the White House echo chamber.

Suddenly, Hillary’s female activists have a big distraction.  John Edwards (age 55) has now admitted to having an affair with a dilettante filmmaker named Rielle Hunter (age 44).  Edwards has admitted to having the affair that began after his wife, Elizabeth (now age 58), had been diagnosed with cancer.  To the Hillarologists, the Edwards caper sounded all too familiar.  It was yet another case of “throw your first wife under the bus” syndrome, with the added feature of doing so while she is in the throes of a medical crisis.  The Clinton supporters must have been reminded of a similar situation involving another candidate in the 2008 Presidential campaign:  John McCain.

Sharon Churcher provided an informative history of McCain’s first marriage in the June 8 issue of Britain’s Daily Mail.  Her article described how McCain (who turns 72 at the end of this month) married the sexy swimwear model named Carol Shepp in 1965.  Carol is only two years younger than John.  Carol had been previously married to one of McCain’s Annapolis classmates, by whom she had two sons: Douglas and Andrew.  When McCain married Carol, he adopted her sons.  During the Christmas season of 1969, while McCain was a prisoner in Viet Nam, Carol was driving to a friend’s house and experienced a horrible automobile accident.  A few hours after the accident, she was found next to the wreckage of her car, having been thrown through the windshield.  Churcher’s article went on to point out that after McCain’s release from the “Hanoi Hilton” and upon his reunion with Carol in 1973, he first learned of Carol’s injuries.  She was no longer the tall model he remembered.  Her doctors “had been forced to cut away huge sections of shattered bone in her legs, taking with it her tall, willowy figure” as Churcher explained.

The Daily Mail article mentioned a man named Ted Sampley, who fought with the Special Forces in Viet Nam.  Mr Sampley was quoted as saying:

“When he came home and saw that Carol was not the beauty he left behind, he started running around on her almost right away. Everybody around him knew it.”

“Eventually he met Cindy and she was young and beautiful and very wealthy. At that point McCain just dumped Carol for something he thought was better.”

The article included the following quote from Carol about McCain’s reason for leaving her:

My marriage ended because John McCain didn’t want to be 40, he wanted to be 25. You know that happens … it just does.

The disgruntled Hillarologists must be aware of the pattern here: opportunistic male politician strays from his first wife after she sustains a physical setback.  The 2008 Presidential campaign brought us two candidates with the same modus operandi.  The fact that they are from different parties shouldn’t exclude John Edwards as a running mate for John McCain.  After all, non-Republican Joe “The Tool” Lieberman has been vying for that spot for over a year.