McCain is not a conservative

Before looking at the individual issues and addressing what my opponent has to say about them, I'd like to make one general statement regarding a central theme that I see popping up all throughout this debate. My opponent wants to have his cake and eat it, too. That is, he wants the debate to be about well-established, long lasting conservative ideologies when it is convenient for him; and he wants it to be about the current mood of the Republican party when that is more convenient. An example: From the very beginning, the central point I have made about the immigration debate is that it has not had the time to crystallize into a clear conservative vs. liberal debate. However, on this particular issue, my opponent wants us to base our debate solely around what conservatives believe right NOW, rather than what a true conservative stance would be. He has failed to explain why, for example, supporting the Real ID card would be conservative. He wants us to accept the fact that most conservative lawmakers support the Real ID card as evidence that it's conservative. However, my opponent does not want this thinking to be applied more broadly ("Just because McCain is the nominee...doesn't mean that he exerts conservative values"), because if it is, there is no debate about McCain's conservatism. If all that matters is the current mood of the Republican party, clearly McCain must be seen as a conservative, since he has won the nomination. I figured, from the beginning, that that's not what my opponent wants the debate to be about, so I have avoided that. For my opponent to resort to talking about the current mood of the Republican party flies directly in the face of good debate standards, as well as sorely devaluing his entire case; for if this is a valid consideration for this debate, my opponent automatically loses, since McCain has been nominated and thus clearly fits in well with the current Republican mood. Immigration - I think I have addressed most of what I have to say here fairly well in the above statement. Again, this issue hasn't had time to become firmly established as a conservative vs. liberal debate, and my opponent has failed to show what makes anything McCain is standing for liberal, or anything he stands against conservative. My opponent says I resorted here to attacking conservatism; what he apparently fails to realize is that I was not attacking conservatism, but questioning whether what conservatives currently stand for here is really conservative. He has not addressed my points here that amnesty is not liberal and the Real ID is not conservative whatsoever, so I automatically win on this point. McCain-Feingold - When I went onto the offensive here, and analyzed my opponent's contention that "conservatives like the Constitution", I admit I was going off on a tangent, and I apologize. However, I maintained the central point I've made in this debate about McCain-Feingold, that my opponent has repeatedly failed to address. That is, McCain-Feingold is not a conservative bill or a liberal bill, but rather an incumbent bill. It is stupid, self-serving, and unconstitutional. But it is not liberal, anymore than it is conservative; so it is irrelevant to this debate. Big government - I didn't say "Paul is the only advocate for small government", I said "He's the small government candidate". There is a huge distinction here. My opponent wants it to seem like I conceded that Ron Paul is the only person for small government in the race, therefore admitting McCain isn't for small government. On the contrary, however, all I said is that Paul is "the small government candidate", meaning that he is the candidate that has made small government his platform in the race. This certainly doesn't preclude any other candidates from having small government stances; it just means Paul has made it his central theme, whereas no one else has. I did, earlier in the debate, also call Paul "the only true advocate for radically smaller government in the race", but the key word there is 'radically'. McCain certainly supports smaller government; this is evidenced by his views on taxes, where he says tax cuts are best when accompanied by spending cuts (and spending cuts=smaller government); my opponent even took note of this himself in his second round ("He only favors tax cuts when they are accompanied with spending cuts."). Judges - My opponent failed to address the point I made here, that McCain doesn't want to get into partisan bickering when appointing judges, but rather just wants to appoint judges that will uphold the law and the Constitution. The true conservative stance on judges would not be appointing ones who promise to vote conservative; a true conservative would want judges who promise to vote in support of the Constitution, and this is what McCain wants. From the very beginning of this debate, we agreed on the definition of conservatism as the modern union of social conservatives, fiscal conservatives, and foreign policy conservatives. These three categories are paramount in judging whether or not someone is conservative, so they ought to carry more weight in deciding this debate than any of the lesser issues we have discussed. Fiscal conservatism - I directly cited a source that looked objectively at McCain's record on every "key vote" (according to the ACU) on taxes since he has been in office. That source showed that McCain has taken the conservative stance on EVERY key tax vote since he has been in Congress, with the sole exception of the initial vote on Bush's tax cuts, which McCain had valid objections to. My opponent repeatedly says we must look at McCain's record on taxes; but I'm the only one of us who HAS looked objectively at his record, and I found, with proof to back it up, that McCain's record here is about as good as it gets from a conservative standpoint. Foreign policy conservatism - My opponent first said that McCain "doesn't have the wherewithall or strategic foresight to manage the complex foreign policy facing our country". Then, when I asked him to back that claim up with at least SOME reasoning, he sidestepped that and took the route that McCain's support of the surge wasn't difficult. However, as I have already said, that doesn't make it any less conservative. That's like saying voting for Reagan's supply-side tax cuts wouldn't be very conservative because everyone was doing it - that's absolutely ridiculous. In a last-ditch effort to give SOME reason to believe McCain is not a conservative here, he points out that McCain is opposed to torture and Guantnamo Bay. In case my opponent forgot, McCain was a POW in Vietnam for a few years, and underwent torture himself. Anyone who could then come home and support the use of torture by the United States probably has a few screws loose. Judging based on his other conservative credentials, it's pretty safe to say McCain would be with other conservative lawmakers on this issue, if he didn't have the experiences he's had. Such an experience would rattle anyone, and his anti-torture stance can hardly be held against him, even by conservative standards. Social conservatism - I'm going to ignore the shameful personal attack my opponent leveled here, and address the issue itself. The fact of the matter is, as my opponent failed to refute, social conservatism forms the backbone of the Republican party and conservatism in the United States. And my opponent conceded from the very beginning that McCain is a social conservative. I never said social conservatism is the only element of conservatism; all I've said is that it's the biggest. McCain is solid here; therefore, he has the backbone of conservatism firmly embedded in him. John McCain is a conservative. Period.