Republican political consultant and former John McCain campaign manager Rick Davis read aloud what he characterized as McCain’s final words Monday at a Phoenix press conference.
Clad in a tan suit and sipping from a water bottle as he sought to keep emotion in check, Davis, national campaign manager for McCain’s 2008 presidential run against then–fellow U.S. senator Barack Obama, read a farewell message touching on themes of patriotism, exceptionalism and tribalism and explicitly looking ahead to McCain’s imminent demise as reflected in this sentences shifting tense:
‘I lived and died a proud American.’Of America’s mission and promise, the farewell message says this:
‘We are citizens of the world’s greatest republic. A nation of ideals, not blood and soil. We are blessed and a blessing to humanity when we uphold and advance those ideals at home and in the world.’But that greatness is not, in the McCain statement’s estimation, impenetrable:
‘We weaken our greatness when we confuse our patriotism with rivalries that have sewn resentment and hatred and violence in all the corners of the globe. We weaken it when we hide behind walls rather than tear them down, when we doubt the power of our ideals rather than trust them to be the great force for change they have always been.’Still:
‘Do not despair of our present difficulties.’See: Trump reportedly rejected statement praising McCain’s life
