The truth hurts. So I guess I can understand why the Republican National Committee (RNC) and the McCain campaign keep crying bloody murder when Democrats call him on his “100 years” in Iraq statement. But does that mean the establishment press have to carry McCain’s water for him?

The lede of a recent Associated Press article read: “The Republican National Committee demanded Monday that television networks stop running a television ad by the Democratic Party that falsely suggests John McCain wants a 100-year war in Iraq.”

So, as you can see, the AP begins by stating as fact the McCain camp’s claim that the Democratic National Committee’s (DNC) recent ad is false. Then it actually directly misstates what the ad says.

As you’ll remember, there was some jousting a few weeks back over whether it was accurate to say that McCain is willing to continue the “war” in Iraq for 50 or 100 years. This is because McCain adds the caveat that it’s fine with him because he thinks that the occupation will soon be like our longstanding presence in Germany, Japan and South Korea, in which we have a substantial troop presence but no soldiers dying in hostile action since the population and governments are content to have us there. So is it really “war,” or only “occupation” or “presence”?

The truth is that McCain’s wishful thinking doesn’t change the fact that he’s saying he’s happy to have U.S. troops stay in Iraq essentially forever (a century, in political terms, is essentially forever), something very few Americans think makes any sense. But the ad doesn’t even get into this question of definitions or McCain’s special pleading about whether it’s “war” or “occupation” or “presence” or whatever. The ad literally just has McCain speaking in his own voice.

The ad begins with a questioner at a New Hampshire town hall saying to McCain, “President Bush has talked about our staying in Iraq for 50 years ... “ McCain responds, “Maybe 100.” And then later, “That’d be fine with me.” It doesn’t get into “war” or “presence” or any of the second- or third-order spin. It just has McCain’s own words. And not only do the RNC and the McCain campaign say that’s false and unacceptable, but the AP agrees.

The rub here is this: McCain does not want to leave Iraq. Period. He wants tens of thousands of troops to stay in Iraq permanently. He made a big point of this during the primaries when it was politically advantageous to do so.

And he followed up with a qualifier explaining that it’s OK because our occupation of Iraq will soon be like our presence in Germany and Japan, where nobody gets killed. But there’s little reason to believe our occupation of Iraq will ever be like that. We tried this in Lebanon; the French tried this in Algeria; the British even tried it in Iraq. Western countries have a very poor history garrisoning Muslim countries in the Middle East. Iraq isn’t like Germany or Japan, not simply because of the history of those countries but because both accepted decades-long U.S. deployments as a counterweight to threatening neighbors. The relevant point is that McCain believes American troops should stay in Iraq permanently. His pipe dream about Iraq turning into Germany doesn’t change that. It just shows his substitution of wishful thinking for sound strategic judgment.

If there is an unfair supposition at work here, there is a simple way to find out. Someone should ask McCain how long he’s willing to have us stay in Iraq even if we are sustaining casualties. Since he believes it is in our strategic interest to stay there on a permanent basis, I doubt very much he’ll say that in that case he’d only be comfortable staying two or five or some other relatively short span of years. That is because he believe we should stay there on a permanent basis, ideally with no casualties but with casualties if that’s what it takes. The New Yorker’s Rick Hertzberg put it all quite elegantly back in January just after McCain started saying this. “McCain,” he wrote, “wants to stay in Iraq until no more Americans are getting killed, no matter how long it takes and how many Americans get killed achieving that goal — that is, the goal of not getting any more Americans killed. And once that goal is achieved, we’ll stay.”

McCain’s position is miles away from where the American people are on Iraq. It’s no mystery why his campaign doesn’t want the Democrats to be harping on this point. But the AP doesn’t need to spin or fib on McCain’s behalf.

Marshall is editor of talkingpointsmemo.com . His column appears in The Hill each week.   E-mail: This email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it