Sen. John McCain blasts 'half-baked, spurious nationalism'; Donald Trump fires back

An emotional Sen. John McCain on Monday leveled a blistering attack on what he called the "half-baked, spurious nationalism" that seems to have inspired President Donald Trump's administration to retreat from the world stage.

In a speech to accept the National Constitution Center's Liberty Medal, McCain, R-Ariz., emphasized that the United States is "a land made of ideals, not blood and soil," a rebuke to the Nazi slogan about bloodlines and territory chanted in August by White supremacists demonstrating in Charlottesville, Virginia.

An at-times raspy-sounding McCain drew applause and cheers at the Philadelphia event when he said:

“To fear the world we have organized and led for three-quarters of a century, to abandon the ideals we have advanced around the globe, to refuse the obligations of international leadership and our duty to remain 'the last, best hope of earth' for the sake of some half-baked, spurious nationalism cooked up by people who would rather find scapegoats than solve problems is as unpatriotic as an attachment to any other tired dogma of the past that Americans consigned to the ash heap of history."

McCain, the Senate Armed Services Committee chairman who is battling an aggressive form of brain cancer, did not mention the name of Trump, with whom he has publicly feuded on and off for more than two years. 

But it was clear that he was talking about the Trump White House, which has taken an "America First" stance toward international affairs.

Trump was criticized for his response to this summer's Charlottesville violence, which included the death of a woman who was hit by a vehicle deliberately driven into a crowd of counter-protesters. Trump said "both sides" were to blame.

On Tuesday morning, Trump shot back at McCain with a warning delivered via a Washington, D.C., radio show.

"Yeah, well, I hear it, and people have to be careful because at some point I fight back," Trump told Chris Plante of WMAL during a broadcast from the Eisenhower Executive Office Building. "I'm being very nice. I'm being very, very nice. But at some point I fight back, and it won't be pretty."

Trump dinged McCain again for his July 28 vote that sank a Senate Republican effort to roll-back the Affordable Care Act, or "Obamacare," "which was a shocker."

McCain appeared to dismiss Trump's response in comments to Capitol Hill reporters. "I've faced far greater challenges than this," he said.

During his Monday speech, McCain emphasized the need for the United States to preserve its ideals at home and "champion" them abroad.

"We have done great good in the world. That leadership has had its costs, but we have become incomparably powerful and wealthy as we did," McCain said. "We have a moral obligation to continue in our just cause, and we would bring more than shame on ourselves if we don’t.

"We will not thrive in a world where our leadership and ideals are absent. We wouldn’t deserve to," he added.

The National Constitution Center said it awarded its Liberty Medal to McCain, a former prisoner of war during the Vietnam War, "for his lifetime of sacrifice and service." Former Vice President Joe Biden bestowed the medal on McCain.

Nowicki is The Republic's national political reporter. Follow him on Twitter, @dannowicki.

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