hey knew that video would make people have respect and sympathy for McCain and realize how much that man has gone through and what a hero that video proves that McCain is!

Certainly the video gives me sympathy for McCain: the look of terror and grief on his face is deeply human. The video doesn't prove him to be a hero in any sense, any more than McCain's apparent violations in the video of the letter of the military code of prisoner conduct at the time prove him to be a weakling or villain - the military later changed the rules based on experiences like McCain's. Nor does it prove that he's up to the job of being president. It's just a fascinating look at a particular moment in time, and a particular case of human suffering.

When he was young, John McCain used to smoke! That's it; I'm voting for Obama. h/t: James, Outside the Beltway.......

Sky News is owned by Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation via his holding in British Sky Broadcasting

That liberal illuminatus, Rupert Murdoch.

The cigarette remark puzzled me too; I guess the notion is that he didn't have it THAT hard if he got a cig. Which is silly of course.

It seems obvious that the interviewers gave him the smoke. Remember not to long ago you could smoke anywhere.I think he was being PC.

That said, it's possible to exaggerate anyone's courage, even McCain's:

That was when the keeper of McCain’s biography, Mark Salter, took the floor. There’s a reason McCain bucks his party, McDonald remembers Salter arguing. It’s because he puts his country ahead of party. Then the speechwriter, who is not known for his dispassion, began to yell: “We’re talking about someone who was willing to die before losing his honor! He would die!”

Of course, McCain did in fact break under torture and give a statement impugning the U.S. But Mr. Salter seems to have gotten caught up in his own imagination.

Is there any indication what her motivation is on this? Seems to me the money involved can't be over-large.