Yea, McCain hasn't been a "Maverick" since at least 2005:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/04/28/mccain-strongly-rejected_n_99082.html"I would hope that we could bring them all home," he said on MSNBC. "I would hope that we would probably leave some military advisers, as we have in other countries, to help them with their training and equipment and that kind of stuff."
Host Chris Matthews pressed McCain on the issue. "You've heard the ideological argument to keep U.S. forces in the Middle East. I've heard it from the hawks. They say, keep United States military presence in the Middle East, like we have with the 7th Fleet in Asia. We have the German...the South Korean component. Do you think we could get along without it?"
McCain held fast, rejecting the very policy he urges today. "I not only think we could get along without it, but I think one of our big problems has been the fact that many Iraqis resent American military presence," he responded. "And I don't pretend to know exactly Iraqi public opinion. But as soon as we can reduce our visibility as much as possible, the better I think it is going to be."
I am shocked that this has never been brought up in the debates, that McCain hasn't explained why he so fundamentally changed his views on this. I don't know WHO is pulling his strings, but I am forced to believe that someone clearly is until I get an answer on this.
The 2008 McCain clearly has some serious new influences that the 2005 McCain did not.
