J-Speaks: The Long Goodbye to the Great Senator from Arizona

Two Saturdays ago, the nation, especially the people of Arizona lost a great servant to the United States after his long battle with cancer. Last week he was eulogized both in the state that he served in our nation’s capital for over three and a half decades and then was honored in the place that he had an incredible second act as a politician after a remarkable first one in the Navy. On Saturday, all of DC’s best from those that served in office, to those that serve currently, family and friends turned out in full force to not only say goodbye to a truly great American who showed how that we are all better when we work together regardless of our differences politically. 

The farewell to six-term Senator John Sidney McCain III (R-AZ), who passed away on Aug. 25 from glioblastoma, an aggressive form of brain cancer and began his political career as a U.S. Congressman of the Arizona’s First District began at the Arizona State Capitol on Wednesday.

On Sunday afternoon, he was buried in a private ceremony at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, MD.  

The 81-year-old father of seven, who was married to the former Cindy Hensley for 36 years body was carried into the Arizona State Capitol with scores of Arizona veterans, members of the military, law enforcement, fire departments and first responders lined the sides of the Capitol Plaza. 

McCain’s body joined former State Senator Marilyn Jarrett in 2006 and Olympic Gold Medalist Jesse Owens as the only other people to have their bodies lie in state at the Arizona Capitol the past four decades. 

Arizona Governor Doug Ducey and his wife, First Lady Angela greeted Mr. McCain’s body once it arrived. 

Among the 3,500 in attendance in the Capitol Rotunda were former Senator Jon Kyl, who echoed a them that was heard throughout the week of tributes saying how Senator McCain “believed in America.” 

He added, “He believed in its people, its values and its institutions,” and that he believed that, “America is stronger for his fierce defense of our values.” 

“Imagining an Arizona without John McCain is like imagining an Arizona without the Grand Canyon. It’s just not normal.”

Also, in attendance were NFL All-Pro wide receiver of the Arizona Cardinals Larry Fitzgerald, who joined former Diamondbacks outfielder and World Series champion Adrian Gonzalez and former forward of the NHL’s Phoenix Coyotes Shane Doan as the three pro athletes of the state to speak at Mr. McCain’s service. 

Fitzgerald said in his remarks that it was their differences that allowed him and Senator McCain together and helped them understand one another. 

“I’m black. He was white. He wasn’t so young,” Fitzgerald said of the many differences that brought them together at the service. “He lived with physical limitations brought on by war. I’m a professional athlete. He ran for president. I run out of bounds. He was the epitome of toughness, and I do everything I can to avoid contact. I have flowing locks, and well, he didn’t.” 

Fitzgerald added, “His work ethic: tireless. His fight: legendary. But what made Senator McCain so special was he cared about the substance of my heart rather than where I came from.” “Yes, ours was an unlikely friendship. But it’s one that I will always cherish.” 

At the close of the private ceremony, members of the McCain family approached the Senator’s coffin to give their goodbyes. 

Mr. McCain’s wife Cindy touched the casket while leaning her left cheek onto it, while his daughter Meghan, a co-host on ABC’s “The View” cried over the loss of her father. 

At Friday service for Mr. McCain at the U.S. Capitol in Washington DC, in a show or irony it was raining as his body was brought up the steps of the Capitol Hill by a military honor guard. His casket was placed on the catafalque built a century-and-a-half ago. He became just the 31^st person to lie in state at the U.S. Capitol Rotunda. 

The Rotunda was jam packed with the country's top leadership from both parties. Also in attendance was Academy Award-winning director and actor Warren Beatty and his wife actress Annette Benning.

The rare honor of lying in state on the Capitol Hill Rotunda, where only 30 prior people have had the honor had a rare showing of bi-partisanship where the leaders of both parties in Charles Schumer (D-NY) and Mitch McConnell (R-KY) of the Senate and Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Paul Ryan (R-WI) of the House of Representative laid wreaths at the casket of the man who for years worked and tangled with on issues like Health Care reform laid. 

“Airing our great debates is the gentle way to describe how John approached the work of a senator,” McConnell said at the service about his long-time colleague, who famous no-vote ended any hope of the repeal of the Affordable Care Act in July 2017.

Representative Ryan called Senator McCain “one of the bravest souls our nation has ever produced. However, you choose to do your part, I hope you do it the way he did it.” 

In another show of rare bi-partisan unity, Minority Leader Pelosi helped 87-year-old Sam Johnson (R-TX) to the Mr. McCain’s casket to pay his respects together. Mr. Johnson ironically enough was McCain’s cellmate for a part of their years at Hanoi’s Hoa Lo Prison main prison, dubbed the “Hanoi Hilton.”

Aside from those famed sparing debates in the Senate chamber, Senator McCain, who also served as Chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee and Senate Armed Services Committee is also remembered for the compromises on immigration, campaign finance and foreign policy reform. 

It is skill he inherited from his 106-year-old mother Roberta, who during the service was wheeled over in her wheelchair to say goodbye through a sign of the cross. She also at one point grasped the hand of her granddaughter Meghan trying to comfort her. 

When it was her turn to say, Meghan sobbed while saying with her shoulders shaking with grief, "I love you." 

Mr. McCain's wife Cindy put her hands together over his casket while her head over the coffin that was covered with the American flag. 

While President Donald Trump was not in attendance, as he was asked not to come by the McCain family, he was represented by Vice President Mike Pence, who said at the service, "As President Trump said yesterday, 'We respect his service.'" 

Outside of the memorial service, the Sun appeared and so did thousands of men, women, children mourners from the District of Columbia as well as across the nation filed passed Mr. McCain’s casket to say their farewells with a salute, a tear, a prayer or just silence throughout the day and into the night. Among those in the crowds were Navy sailors dressed to the nines in their whites. Average citizens that Mr. McCain never met and now will never meet but were touched by his example of service and sacrifice. 

“History in the making and I wanted to be present for that. I wanted to be here,” one man said to NBC News’ Chief Foreign Affairs Correspondent Andrea Mitchell on Friday. 

“Today he lies in the place where he served to the last, Congress of the United States,” Vice President Mike Pence said at the service on Friday. “Soon he will go to rest on the grounds where he served first, The United States Naval Academy.”  

Before his body was moved from Capitol Hill to Washington’s National Cathedral on Saturday morning, upon Mr. McCain’s request his motorcade paused at the Vietnam Veteran’s Memorial on a six-mile route. McCain’s wife Cindy laid a wreath at the Memorial as a showing of honor by her late husband’s respect for those that made the ultimate sacrifice.  

At Senator McCain’s Funeral at the National Cathedral on Saturday, where 2,500 people were in attendance the private ceremony that consisted of Washington’s political elite, former Presidents George W. Bush, Barack Obama, Bill Clinton and his wife former First Lady, New York Senator and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, House and Senate colleagues and senior officials from the current White House staff like Chief of Staff John Kelly.

Among those who gave eulogies were his oldest daughter Meghan, who said of her father, “I am here before today saying the words I have never wanted to say. Feeling the loss, I have never wanted to feel. My father is gone,” were the words of Senator McCain’s oldest daughter on Saturday at his funeral while a few tears came down from her face. 

She added, “He was a great warrior. He was a great American. I admire him for all these things, but I love him because he was a great father.” 

A former senate colleague of Connecticut, along with the two people who beat Mr. McCain for the highest office in the land also spoke at a service that was essentially a rebuke of the political, social, and racial discourse that has plagued our nation, especially after the election of Donald Trump. 

“John’s great strength was his character,” former Senator Joe Lieberman (I-CT) said. “He was honest, fair and civilized.” 

Liberman, who Senator McCain once tried to recruit him as his running mate back in 2008 said about that moment, “You’re a Democrat. I’m a Republican. We can give our country the bi-partisan leadership it needs for a change.”

Former President Barack Obama, who beat Mr. McCain in 2008 Presidential election said of being asked to speak at his funeral showed his “irreverence.” 

“His sense of humor. A little bit of a mischievous streak. After all, what better way to get a last laugh then to make George and I say nice things about him a national audience.” 

That last comment got a laugh out of Mrs. McCain and one of her sons who was seated right next to here in his Navy uniform. 

Former President Bush, who beat Senator McCain for the Republican nomination for President 18 years ago said that back in the day Senator McCain would frustrate him and he would say the same thing about him. Mr. Bush said though that McCain made him better. 

“He was honest, no matter who it offended. Presidents were not spared. In the end I got to enjoy one of life’s great gifts, the friendship of John McCain,” the 43^rd President of our nation said. 

The two former Presidents of the United States also talked about how important McCain’s ability to respect others, regardless of their political differences was necessary in a time where it seems the ability to create compromise in our nation’s capital and across the nation seems out of sight. 

That so-called divided America referenced by the two former leaders of our country was aimed at the feet of the current occupier of The White House in Mr. Trump who reportedly was not invited to, even though his daughter Ivanka and her husband Jared Kushner were in attendance along with the previously mentioned Chief of Staff Kelly. 

While Mr. Trump was not in attendance at the service, nor his name never mentioned by any of the speakers, but each speech had an underlying reference to what his twitter rants, his behavior in his speeches and his representation of us abroad were and underlying reference. 

In a recent interview with "Bloomberg News" Mr. Trump says he has no regrets about how he handled Mr. McCain's passing. 

"We had our disagreements and they were very strong disagreements," President Trump said. "With that being said I respect his service to the country."

Mr. Obama called all the strife, drummed up drama and in fighting across the political isle can seem as he put it, “small and mean, and petty.” “John called on us to be bigger than that. He called on us to be better than that.” 

Mr. Bush said in agreement with Mr. Obama said that Mr. McCain “detested the abuse of power. Could not abide bigots and swaggering despites.” 

Perhaps the biggest rebuke of how Mr. Trump has conducted himself as the leader of the free world came from Meghan McCain said in a defiant tone in reference to his campaign slogan “Make American Great Again,” “The America of John McCain has no need to be made great again because America was always great.” 

Two Saturdays ago, the United States of America lost a great solider and a great Senator in John Sidney McCain III who served the nation with dignity, integrity, grit, courage, honor, love, and respect. That as Mr. Obama put some principles “transcend politics” and that some values “transcend party.”

That you can have a spirited debate with someone, sometimes passionately, but never question that person’s patriotism. The week of memorial services for McCain were personally designed by him, from the people that were invited to speak to those in attendance from Arizona to Washington, DC as a final call for respect, decency, and unity to one another from those that serve in our nation’s capital to those that serve at the state and local level.  

The hope going forward is that the legacy of Mr. McCain will turn into immediate and consistent action and not just be words. 

The kind of action that made everyone who new the great senator personally to those that just knew of him from his service in the Navy and on Capitol Hill come to pay their respects to someone who was the true definition of a hero. 

“Like so many other heroes, you leave us draped in the flag you loved,” Meghan McCain said. “We don’t put heroes on pedestals just to remember them. We raise them up because we want to emulate their virtues. This is how we honor them and this is how we will honor you.” 

Information and quotations are courtesy of 8/27/18 People.com article, “Will Melania Trump Attend Sen. John McCain’s Funeral? The White House Responds to Speculation?” by Jodi Guglielmi; 8/29/18 www.cbsnews.com story “John McCain Lies in State at Arizona Capitol,” by Emily Tillett; 8/30/18 www.sportingnews.com story “Larry Fitzgerald Speaks at Sen. John McCain’s Funeral,” by Kristie Chiappelli; 8/31/18 6:30 p.m. edition of “CBS Evening News with Jeff Glor,” hosted by John Dickerson, with report from Chief Congressional Correspondent Nancy Cordes; 8/31/18 7 p.m. "Inside Edition" on WCBS 2 New York with Diane McInerney; 9/1/18 7 a.m. edition of NBC News’ “Today,” with Sheinelle Jones and Kristen Welker, with report from Chief Foreign Affairs Correspondent Andrea Mitchell;  9/1/18 6:30 p.m. edition of “NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt,” with reports from White House Correspondent Kelly O’Donnell and Chief Foreign Affairs Correspondent Andrea Mitchell; 9/1/18 11:30 p.m. edition of WABC 7 “Eyewitness News, “ with Joe Torres, weather anchor Jeff Smith and sports anchor Sam Ryan, with report of ABC News’ Elizabeth Hur; https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_McCain; and https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sam_Johnson.