Video: McCain Joins the Anti-Obama "Deathers"

Posted by Faiz Shakir, Think Progress at 6:16 PM on September 4, 2009.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Over the past month, ThinkProgress has traveled to town hall events across the country to report what we’re seeing on the ground. This is our fifth eyewitness report.

This past Tuesday, Sens. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and John McCain (R-AZ) took their nationwide health care road show to Florida, where they teamed up with Sen. Mel Martinez (R-FL) to participate in a closed-door town hall event at the Palmetto General Hospital in Hialeah. ThinkProgress attended the forum.

During the question-and-answer session, Jim Dolan, president of the Florida Medical Association, expressed his anger with the American Medical Association for supporting President Obama’s health care plan. We "repudiate that action on their part," Dolan said, speaking for his Florida chapter.

Dolan went on to propagate a version of the false "death panels" myth, claiming that the Obama administration is promoting "dranconian rationing that Rahm Emanuel’s brother, Ezekiel, talks about as though it’s going down to pick up a loaf of bread." Dolan wondered when are people going to realize that "the people advising this president" feel that the seniors "are expendable."

Rather than distance himself from Dolan’s false assertion, McCain wholeheartedly embraced it:

McCAIN: Doctor, I know you have a day job, but I’d like to take you with me wherever I go. [Laughter] I’ve never heard it more eloquently put than you just stated the situation.

When his former running mate Sarah Palin first offered the false "death panel" claim last month, McCain defended her. He said that end-of-life counseling "at least opens the door to a possibility of rationing."

Tagged as: health care, mccain, john mccain, senior citizens, death panel, rationing

Faiz Shakir is the Research Director at the Center for American Progress and serves as Editor of ThinkProgress.org and The Progress Report.