By Ken Bode

His nickname on Capitol Hill is "Senator Hothead," earned by the legendary eruptions of temper over the years he has served in both houses of Congress.

John McCain knows he has a bad temper. In the books he has written and those written about him, the temper always comes up. In his 2002 memoir, he said this: "My temper has often been both a matter of public speculation and personal concern. I have a temper, to state the obvious, which I have tried to control, with varying degrees of success because it does not always serve my interest or the public's."

How bad is it? Bad enough that the incidents of his outbursts have raised doubts among his colleagues that he has the proper temperament to be president. Former Republican Sen. Bob Smith of New Hampshire served with McCain for 12 years. He recently told The Washington Post that he's witnessed plenty of McCain's temper and outbursts, some directed at him personally. "If you challenge him, you risk a blow-up," says Smith. "It's more than just temper. It's this need of his to show you that he's above you." Smith says McCain's sneering, condescending attitude has damaged his relationships in Congress.

One McCain outburst is legendary in Arizona. McCain blew up at a young volunteer who had failed to put the proper riser behind his podium, including a finger-jabbing in the chest. "You incompetent little (expletive)," McCain screamed, "when I tell you to do something, you do it!"

McCain acknowledges that problem, sort of. "As an adult, I've been known to forget occasionally the discretion expected of a person of my many years and station, when I believe I've been accorded a lack of respect I did not deserve."

Others, including those who have worked for McCain, say the problem is deeper than that. First, he has rabbit ears -- he's always looking for slights. Mark Salter, who has co-authored McCain's five books, says simply, "Sometimes he can't govern his tongue."

At a Senate hearing in 1992, Iowa Sen. Charles Grassley disagreed with McCain over a prisoner-of-war issue. McCain burst into a rage and mocked Grassley with profanities. It ended in a shouting and shoving match. In a debate over a national security nomination, a furious McCain accosted Alabama Republican Sen. Richard Shelby, got into his face and screamed at him. Events like this always make news in Washington, as this one did.

David Keene, longtime president of the American Conservative Union, believes McCain's problem is that he takes any disagreement personally. Countless senators have saved their letters of apology from McCain: Don't take my outburst and insults seriously; you know I really respect you.

McCain brushes off the problem, saying on CNN, "People want me to vent. When I see corruption, people misbehaving badly, they expect me to be angry."

If you expect anger from McCain, you certainly won't be disappointed. It has raised questions among reasonable people about whether his inability to control his temper will get McCain and the country in trouble. Former Mississippi Sen. Thad Cochran, often the target of McCain's insults over their disagreements about earmarks, said recently, "The thought of McCain in the Oval Office sends a cold chill down my spine."

The anger, the intolerance, the hair-trigger temper. These are worrisome qualities in a president. The mocking condescension he directs at his opponents is not an admirable part of his personality.

A stable, controlled temperament is perhaps more important than anything else in a president, and Smith makes a point to consider when he says of McCain: "His temper would place this country at risk in international affairs, and the world, perhaps, in danger. In my mind, it should disqualify him."

Bode is the former national political correspondent for NBC News and a former political analyst for CNN

http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dl...=2008809190388

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Life is a cannibal.

This has been a concern for me as well.

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“Share everything with your brother. Do not say, ‘It is private property.’ If you share what is everlasting, you should be that much more willing to share things which do not last.”
~ The Didache

"Not to enable the poor to share in our goods is to steal from them and deprive them of life. The goods we possess are not ours, but theirs."
~St. John Chrysostom

McCain's temper has been known about and well documented for twenty years (or more). Anybody who does not know about it by now should just stay home on E Day.

And it makes me like him more. He isn't like all the other (*)(*)(*)(*)(*)(*)bag politicians. He's got spunk.

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My enduring personal, original quote: Many mistake what should rightly be called "passivism" for pacifism. Pacifism and passivism are COMPLETELY different.
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Ronald Reagan was not the only one to suffer from Alzheimer's Disease. America did, too.
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"I know the human being and fish can coexist peacefully." --President George W. Bush.
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Los Angeles voters=dumber than rocks.

why wernt we worried about Hillary's temper I mean she destroy half the white house when bill and monica got going.