What’s an event featuring Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., without a couple of classic yucks from the salty former Navy captain to break the ice? At Tuesday’s Atlantic Council forum to address very serious NATO alliance issues, the U.S. Naval Academy grad and 2008 GOP presidential nominee didn’t disappoint, offering jokes about both his life experiences.
He opened with a nod to fellow speaker former Sen. John Warner, R-Va., who served in the Navy and Marine Corps. Said McCain, “When I graduated from the Naval Academy, I tried to get into the Marine Corps but my parents were married.” [One of the old naval service barbs is that marines are all illegitimate children.]
Then the former Navy pilot and Vietnam War POW added that his son is a marine who ribs his dad that: “The Marine Corps is part of the Navy Department, the men’s department.”
McCain also told a favorite from the campaign trail. Pointing to another speaker at the NATO forum, New Hampshire Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, he recalled an old joke from 1976 presidential candidate Mo Udall, then an Arizona Democrat. He told of how Udall, campaigning in Manchester, N.H., went into a barber shop for a haircut.
“Hi, I’m Mo Udall from Arizona and I’m running for president,” McCain quoted the folksy former lawmaker saying. “Yeah,” he said one of the barbers responded, “we were just laughing about that this morning.”
